Gela Mtivlishvili, Kakheti
Chechen refugees sheltering in Pankisi Gorge blame the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in their discrimination on ethnic grounds. According to the refugees, the UNHCR promised each family to allocate 8-10 thousand USD if they naturalize in Georgia. After this offer, the Chechen refugees declined the refugee status and obtained the citizenship of Georgia; however, the UNHCR did not keep their promises.
About 8 thousand people arrived in Georgia after the Chechen-Russian conflict renewed in 1999. According to the statistic data, nowadays, 2 000 Chechen refugees are registered in the country. Most of them are ethnic Kists; only 500 of them are ethnic Chechens. Nowadays, the number of refugees living in Pankisi Gorge is about 800.
In the second half of 2009 the UNHCR started the project in support of the integration of Chechen refugees into local society; the project aims to support the refugees to naturalize in Georgia. In order to implement the project, the UNHCR worked out the packet for the support of reintegration of those refugees whose applications on naturalization are satisfied by the Public Registration Agency. In November f 2009, the government of Georgia satisfied the first 18 applications; after what the UNHCR created a special commission for accommodation and assistance. The Commission is entitled: to make decision on the adoption of the packet for the support of local integration about the relevance of a refugee family; to estimate the assistance forms of the packet in the support of integration; to work out criteria to implement the packet. The Commission resoluted on October 12, 2009 that every naturalized refugee will receive the main grant for integration and part of annual money allowance together with the accommodation grant. The integration grant for the head of the family and his spouse is 500 USD for each; other family members will receive 100 USD each. Annual money allowance means preliminary payment of the monthly allowances for entire 12 months; monthly allowance is 28 GEL.
In November of 2009, the UNHCR spread the abovementioned information in Pankisi Gorge with the support of their office in Akhmeta. In addition to that, the Chechen refugees living in the gorge received a magazine “Shelter” published in Georgian, Russian and English languages; it is a periodical publication of the UNHCR and the UN Association.
The magazine states those refugee families from Chechnya will receive 8-10 thousand USD who obtained Georgian citizenship and who received monthly allowance of the UNHCR after the reductions in March of 2009. The magazine also estimates the criteria for selecting the grantees: a refugee family with 4 and more members, who needs long-term accommodation and currently lives in the collective center or shelters relatives will receive 10 000 USD. A refugee family with less than 3 members will receive 8 000 USD.
Chechen refugee Esiat Baghajashvili submitted naturalization applications for himself and his children to the Public Registration Agency in December of 2009. “I arrived here from Chechnya because of the war in 1999. Until then, I lived in Grozny together with my wife for 5 years where our two children were born. When we arrived in Georgia, refugee collective centers were overcrowded and we sheltered our relatives. But our relatives had a large family and we moved to the house of our acquaintance where we still live. Since 1999 we have been receiving aid for refugees – food and other products which later were changed into money; a family member receives 28 GEL per month and it was hardly enough to live on. Currently, we are in a very difficult situation; we get neither assistance nor other income. The allowances were stopped in February of 2010 after we obtained Georgian citizenship; however the UNHCR does not give us the money they promised for the purchase of a house. They said you do not live in a collective center and the most important is that we are not ethnic Chechen people – we are Kists and they can give only 2 500 USD instead promised 8 000 USD. We cannot buy a house in Pankisi Gorge with the money. If I had declined the refugee status, the state was obliged to give a shelter to me; now I will remain homeless,” said Esiat Baghakashvili living in the village of Duisi in Pankisi Gorge.
“We do not live in the collective center because there was no place there. I hoped we could get our own house at least after naturalization but as I see we will remain without shelter,” said Irina Kavtarashvili, a resident of Duisi village.
According to the verified information, the Akhmeta office of the UNHCR assisted the families of Kako Borchashvili, Pati Kavtarashvili, Marina Machalikashvili and others with the promised 8-10 thousand USD; though they do not live in collective centers and are ethnic Kists.
Interim head of the Akhmeta office of the UNHCR Koki Peradze said that the project, which has been implementing since 2009, was pilot project. “The project continued in 2010 too but it was amended based on the experience gained during the pilot phase and in accordance to the donor’s assistance who reduced the funding. Besides that, on the first stage of the project we found out that the families, who already had houses, received the assistance. Many people have registered houses in the Pankisi Gorge at the Public Registration Agency and it is impossible to estimate the owner. Consequently, we give the 8-10 thousand USD only to ethnic Chechen people who obtained Georgian citizenship and live in collective centers,” said Peradze and added that the UNHCR is not going to correct these criteria.
Ethnic Kists, who declined the refugee status and obtained Georgian citizenship, intend to start a hunger-strike in front of the Akhmeta office of the UNHCR.
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