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Platform No to Phobia Reacts to the Ongoing Developments in front of the House of Justice

December 10, 2018
 
Platform No to Phobia reacts to the ongoing developments in front of the House of Justice and calls on the law enforcement bodies to immediately take adequate measures to unblock the entrance to the administrative institution, as it hinders its functioning and disables people to get service in the House of Justice.
 
The released videos showed that people gathered in front of the House of Justice do not allow foreigners to enter the building. They protest the December 7, 2018 ruling of the Constitutional Court of Georgia, based on which restrictions on the purchase of agricultural plots by foreign citizens were annulled. The protesters state they will not allow aliens to misappropriate Georgian lands in the period of time until the new edition of the Constitution goes in force. Xenophobic statements were made during the protest rally.

It is noteworthy that blockade of the state institution and hindering its functioning is inadmissible and is legitimate ground to restrict freedom of assembly and manifestation. “It is inadmissible, during the assembly or manifestation, to make appeals…. which cause national, religious or social conflict and creates threats towards this action.” If these requirements are violated, law enforcement bodies shall take adequate measures and combat illegal manifestation, as well as arrest the people who disobey the lawful requirements of the law enforcement officers.

It is extremely alarming that the racism, xenophobia and aggressive attitude towards the people with different views or identity have become stronger in the recent period. Unfortunately, often the State encourages violence facts, when it adopts the discriminative laws in relation with the aliens and does not have strategy to fight against racism and xenophobia. In this light, instead exercising strict policy against harassers, the State conducts aggressive campaign against political opponents and tolerates violence acts (dispersal of the peaceful demonstrators protesting the raid in Bassiani instead dismissing the group of aggressive protesters; reaction of the government officials to the assault in Akhalkalaki during the pre-election period; other cases of physical assaults on political opponents, and more). In addition to that, politicians use xenophobic rhetoric. The statement of the MP Otar Danelia, chairperson of the parliamentary committee on agriculture issues is also worth to mention: “If I was not an MP, I would have been with them too,” he said. 

We call on: 
The law enforcement bodies: to immediately take measures to combat illegal manifestation;
The Government of Georgia: to exercise strict policy against all forms of xenophobia and elaborate the strategy to fight against racism and xenophobia. 
  • Georgian Democracy Initiative (GDI)
  • Equality Movement
  • Institute for Democracy and Safe Development (IDSD)
  • Safari
  • Media Development Fund (MDF)
  • Tolerance and Diversity Institute (TDI)
  • Georgian Young Lawyers’ Association (GYLA)
  • Georgian Reforms Association (GRASS)
  • Transparency International – Georgia
  • Human Rights Center (HRC)

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