Expert: In Armenia's regions are extremely disabled unfriendly

 Armen Alaversyan, the head of Unison NGO, says Armenia's regions are extremely disabled unfriendly. 

Talking to reporters on February 29, he said Yerevan is the only place in the country where progress is evident when it comes to disabled friendly buildings and pavements. Special tactile pathways will be installed in subways to offer increased orientation and coded information for the visually impaired, Alaverdyan explained. 

Experts are concerned over insufficiently disabled-friendly hotels, hospitals and educational establishments. 
"There are over 100 inclusive education schools with no sanitary conveniences for the disabled.  The same situation is in hospitals and hotel rooms," Alaverdyan said.

He welcomed the fact that all the higher educational establishments supported the idea to create disabled- friendly environment.  He said only 1% of the students are disabled in the country.  According to the assessments, only 7%-8% of the employable disabled have jobs. "It is not a high indicator, but more and more private and state-run companies have been employed disabled, including in the IT- sector," he said.

As of Jan 1 2016, 200,177 disabled people - children account for 7,801 people or 3,9% of total - were registered in Armenia, which is 6.6% of the total population.