The European Charter for European Languages, in its recommendations on Armenia, touched upon a number of important topics that relate directly to Armenia's national minorities.

The monitoring reports of the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages Secretariat noted a large number of Council of Europe recommendations regarding Yazidi community in Armenia. The CoE report noted the need to enable the community to have access to pre-school education in Yazidi language. According to the state report, ten modular pre-school educational institutions are provided in Armenia at the expense of the state budget, one of which is located in the village of Yazidi community Alagyaz, Aragatsotn Region. The CoE report notes that the state ensures the right to pre-school education for the children of both Alagyaz and six neighboring Yazidi villages.

The state report notes that some 1,864 school-age children receive education in their native language (Yazidi) in the schools of Aragatsotn, Ararat region, Armavir and Kotayk regions of the Republic of Armenia.

The CoE in its recommendations noted the necessity of introducing Yazidi language public television programming on a regular basis. Related departments of the Public Radio of Armenia produce and broadcast radio programs in Yazidi language with a duration of 15 minutes a day. Public Radio has created a Yazidi section on their website where they publish news in Yazidi language. Yazidi section of the Web site operates 24 hours a day and the network radio station broadcasts Yazidi national music.

The CoE has recommended that the official Armenian authorities promote the use or adoption of Yazidi toponyms, in accordance with the orthography of the language.

The CoE is in favour of providing a large part of pre-school education in Assyrian, Greek and Yazidi languages. Numerous reports produced by the CJEC have repeatedly pointed out that there is no Yazidi pre-school education in Yazidi language in Armenia.

The CoE recommends improving the teaching of minority languages in primary and secondary schools by increasing the number of weekly lessons, promoting teacher training and producing modern teaching materials.

Although the state claims that teacher training and new teaching methods and certification have been developed and disseminated, in reality Yazidi community will lose the opportunity to receive education in their native language at all levels of the educational system in the near future.

Part of the CoE recommendations:

The CoE recommends that public television programs be broadcast in Assyrian, Greek, Kurdish and Yazidi languages on a regular basis and for a sufficiently long period of time;

The CoE recommends that measures be taken to ensure that speakers of Assyrian, Greek, Kurdish, Russian and Yazidi can use their language in their contacts with administrative and judicial authorities;

The CoE recommended promoting the use or adoption of place names in minority languages in municipalities. According to the Armenian legislation, naming proposals and renaming of geographical objects may be carried out by State and local self-government bodies, non-governmental organizations, legal entities and natural persons. According to the geographic location proposals for objects are submitted to the relevant regional governor of the RA.

It has become known that the Committee on Real Estate Cadastre together with the professional commission set up by the Armenian government has been examining the proposal on naming or renaming geographical objects within a month. According to the Armenian legislation names of geographical objects in Armenia are given in Armenian. It was mentioned that the use of topographic signs and signboards in minority languages is not a big problem in Armenia. Whenever there is a need to place street names and other topographical indications for the public and signs in minority languages this issue is regulated by the Law "On Language of the Republic of Armenia" which stipulates that the state and self-government bodies of the Republic of Armenia, enterprises, institutions and organizations must produce signboards, papers, stamps, seals, international postal envelopes, all means of advertising in Armenian and combine them with other languages as needed.

The CoE recommends ensuring adequate funding for cultural activities and national minority associations to ensure the development of minority languages, including extracurricular education. Due to the need to address the issue, the Council for National Minorities discussed this at its meetings in previous years and adopted a condition for the distribution of funds to national minority NGOs financed from the state budget.

The report is available on the official website of the Council of Europe European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages at the link:

 https://rm.coe.int/armenia