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Ombudsman about Ineffective Work of the Prosecutor’s Office and Prisoners’ Rights

April 2, 2015
 
Lela Kuntchulia, Radio Liberty/Free Europe 

Inhuman treatment of prisoners, abuse of power by law enforcement officers, delayed investigation into high-profile cases, homophobia and restriction of freedom of religion are still problematic in Georgia – it is one part of the main problems presented in the annual report of the Public Defender of Georgia. On April 1, Ombudsman Ucha Nanuashvili presented the problems to the media at the briefing. The Public Defender submitted the report to the Parliament of Georgia on March 31; it describes situation of human rights and basic freedoms in Georgia in 2014.

The Public Defender started briefing with the violence against prisoners and by law enforcement officers. Although Ucha Nanuashvili said torture and inhuman treatment is no longer systemic crime, it is fact that number of complaints about inhuman treatment has increased in 2014 in comparison to 2013.  The Ombudsman’s office sent 28 proposals on similar facts to the Chief Prosecutor’s Office and requested start of the investigation. The results are not satisfactory for the Public Defender and he believes it is important to speed up working on the establishment of independent investigative body as it is required by the Human Rights Action Plan; moreover it is not problem for penitentiary establishments.

“Our monitoring revealed that not only the personnel of penitentiary establishments but also police officers abused their power in separate cases. It is particularly significant to note that similar facts most frequently happen in the western Georgia. Unfortunately, the work of the prosecutor’s offices of Georgia to investigate similar crimes and punish perpetrators is ineffective.”

In accordance to the Public Defender’s Report, timely forensic expertise, withdraw of video-footage from video-cameras and other evidence are still problematic. The Ombudsman believes it is essential that National Preventive Mechanism (NPM) had right to photo and video-recording inside closed institutions as well as access to video-recordings.

In his conversation with the Radio Liberty/Free Europe, the head of Human Rights Center Aleko Tskitishvili evaluated comprehensive monitoring of penitentiary establishments as a problem. He believes the work of the 35-member NPM is huge progress but like many representatives of the civil society he also thinks it is important to create public monitoring mechanism in addition. According to the observation of his organization, besides medical problems prisoners mostly complain about injustice: 

“Victims of torture and inhuman treatment in the past years are still in prisons; they claim they were placed in prisons based on illegal judgments. These people still expect the state to take measures to restore justice but it has not happened yet.”

Pardon Commission member lawyer Lia Mukhashavria recalled that sometimes prisoners do not plead guilty but they urge for pardon because they have lost hope for fair trial. The head of the nongovernmental organization Human Rights Priority underlined one more problem, which is also discussed in the Public Defender’s Annual Report –delayed investigation into high-profile cases. The Ombudsman’s report lists cases of Zurab and Yuri Vazagashvili’s murders, physical abuse of MP Nugzar Tsiklauri from UNM, allegedly illegal restriction of freedom of the Tbilisi City Hall employees, alleged illegal removal of Vano Merabishvili from the prison, so-called Tractors Case and Cabal Case.

Like Ombudsman, neither Lia Mukhashavria is satisfied with the work of the prosecutor’s office:

“Ongoing investigations into high-profile cases do not seem of high quality and successful. For example, as if they resolved [Yuri] Vazagashvili’s murder case and found the murderer but this case still raise many serious questions. And second, the society is not interested who killed him but who ordered it.”

As for other main concerns reviewed in the Ombudsman’s 2014 Report, they are gender equality, violence against women and scope of domestic violence in the country. Femicide is named as one of the most significant problems that is farther aggravated with the fact that in several cases the killed women had applied to law enforcement bodies for help but the police could not prevent the crime.
 
The report names homophobic approach to LGBT community as a problem. As for freedom of religion, the Ombudsman believes, it is still problematic to get permission on the construction of religious buildings, to obtain ownership rights over disputed buildings and also religious discrimination in the public education system as well as implementation of the requirements of the Law on General Education.” Effective investigation into the crimes committed based on possible religious grounds is also a problem.

 

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