Unable or Unwilling?!

Georgia’s Faulty Investigation of Crimes Committed during and after the Russo-Georgian War of August 2008

Norwegian Helsinki Committee Published Report regarding the process of investigation of war crimes during the August 2008 conflict entitled Unable or Unwilling.

“Overall, it would seem that the information provided by the survey of the ECHR applicants indicates that the Georgian authorities are at least both partly unable and partly unwilling to conduct an effective investigation into international crimes allegedly committed during and after the August 2008 war,” – states the monitoring report of Norwegian Helsinki Committee.

The Norwegian Helsinki Committee (NHC) has worked closely with many Georgian and international human rights groups in documenting and reporting about crimes committed during and after the 2008 war. Three Georgian human rights groups have contributed with research for this report, namely Article 42, Georgian Young Lawyers’ Association (GYLA) and Georgia’s Human Rights Center (HRC). However, responsibility for analyses and conclusions rests with the NHC.

Data for this report was collected in November and December 2010 by the following researchers:  Nino Doliashvili, Dato Gioshvili, Neli Kareli, Nino Qurasbediani, Qeri Saraji (all from Article 42); Nino Jomaridze (from GYLA); Shorena Latatia, Nika Legashvili, Giorgi Margiani, Saba Tsitsikashvili (all from HRC); Aage Borchgrevink and
Simon Papuashvili (both from the NHC).

The report was  written by Aage Borchgrevink and Simon Papuashvili, and edited by Aage Borchgrevink and Gunnar M. Ekeløve-Slydal (from NHC).

The report was presented to International Criminal Court (ICC) in Hague on May 23rd. The executive director of Human Rights Center Ucha Nanuashvili attended the presentation as well.