Rebellion in Women’s Colony Was Subdued by Force

Nona Salaghaia

After the rebellion in the Tbilisi Women’s Colony the female inmates were taken to Rustavi Prison # 1. Their conditions in custody are unbearable. Zaza Khatiashvili, president of the Trade Union of the Lawyers of Georgia, stated that the rights of the inmates are violated.

They do not have drinking water; they are not supplied with hygiene items; the prisoners cannot get parcels from their family members and moreover, their relatives cannot get information from the prisoners. The family members think, the rebellion was provoked by the administration of the Women’s Colony. The attorneys claim that the inmates requested to meet human rights defenders and journalists. The inmates wanted to inform the society about their problems. They demanded to protect their rights and protested the criteria for the selection of the inmates who were pardoned by the president. They claimed that women who were charged for premeditated murder were pardoned, but pregnant women and those with many children were not and remained prisoners.

Attorneys stated the prisoners were taken out through a hole in the back wall of the Women’s Colony, which had been made rapidly, and then put them into cars. From there, the female inmates were taken to Rustavi Prison. Nana Kakabadze, director of the non-governmental organization Former Prisoners for Human Rights, stated that all of them were physically assaulted. 10 women have injuries on their bodies. Two of them, Manana Mskhiladze and Vulsafa Aivazova are seriously injured.

Nana Kakabadze spoke about the violations that occurred during the subduing of the rebellion in the Women’s Colony.

In conjunction with the policemen, officials from the Constitutional Security Department and Special Operative Department were deployed in the Women’s Colony. They were not wearing their uniforms and arrived at the place by jeeps. As a result, it was impossible to identify them. We asked which institution they represented but nobody answered us. However, we managed to recognize the state numbers of several cars and today we can declare that the same people took part also in the dispersal of the demonstrators in front of the Parliament. Dimitri Shashkin, Minister of Penitentiary, Probation and Legal Aid, arrived in the Women’s Colony together with the representatives of the international organizations and the public defender’s office. Shashkin stated that in order to avoid being accused of plotting the rebellion the representatives of the international organizations personally observed that the female inmates were not injured while being transported from Colony N 5 to Rustavi Prison N 1.

Dimitri Shashkin said: “We asked them to accompany us to the Rustavi Prison to show that there had been no violence used against inmates. These people were transported to Rustavi Prison without any injuries. This prison was opened in February 2009 and complies with all standards; the cells are not overcrowded. The Colony N 1 is designed for 630 inmates and 600 women are placed there”

The Trade Union of Lawyers do not trust the current government and the law enforcement bodies of Georgia and is going to appeal to the European Court to protect the rights of the 742 inmates who were taken to Rustavi Colony 1.