Police and Civil Contract MP Propose 24-Hour Monitoring Project

The Ministry of Internal Affairs will have round-the-clock access to the entrances and exits of cafes, restaurants, pharmacies, hotels, commercial venues, gas stations, and filling stations, and will monitor the flow of people in public places. This was reported by the newspaper "Zhoghovurd".

The ministry mandates that large economic operators and companies install surveillance cameras in their facilities and ensure 24-hour access to these devices for the Ministry of Internal Affairs.

A package of amendments to the law on police and several other laws has been authored by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and MP Hayk Sargsyan from the Civil Contract party. The National Assembly has accepted the bill in the first reading, and it will be finalized in September.

According to the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the objective is to reduce the number of crimes in public places.

Under the bill, surveillance cameras will be mandatory in banks, credit organizations, pawnshops, pharmacies, foreign exchange points with separate entrances, postal service facilities, educational institutions, organizations dealing in arms, commercial entities with a surface area of 100 square meters or more, as well as retail points for liquid fuel, compressed natural gas, liquefied petroleum gas, or hydrocarbons, in trade venues, metro stations, underground parking lots, and public catering facilities with an area of 50 square meters or more.

The Ministry of Internal Affairs will have access to the surveillance footage in a 24-hour regime.

Former MP Armen Yeghiazaryan emphasized in a conversation with us that the bill is unconstitutional as it disrupts the privacy of individuals and poses a significant risk to commercial businesses: "We all know how the state system operates today, the extent of information leakage; this also carries serious corruption risks as we do not know what will happen to the information obtained from the cameras. Third parties will have to monitor who met with whom in cafes and business areas, and it is possible that these cameras will also record voices, meaning conversations can be overheard. This project will not only disrupt people’s personal lives but also deal a heavy blow to the business class, as there is no similar initiative in any other country where police monitor people's movements 24 hours a day," said the former parliament member.

For more details, see the original source.