Strasbourg Court Announces a New Contest for the selection of ECHR Judges from Georgia

A new contest for the selection of candidates to the position of judges at the European Human Rights Court from Georgia was announced today. The contest is open to any citizen of Georgia from the age of 30 to 65, who has an excellent command of the national language; as well as one of the official languages if the Council of Europe ​​(English or French); has an exhaustive knowledge of the European Convention of Human Rights and the principles of international public law and Georgian legislation; has a working experience in this field with respect to the relevant case law.

Candidates must meet requirements set by the Georgian legislation for holding the high judicial position or should be a recognized and competent law expert; should have at least five-year experience and high moral and professional reputation. Documents and applications are accepted until March 14, 2017.

Applications from three candidates will be selected by a special government commission, which will include:

Minister of Justice, Chair of the Commission;

Representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Deputy Chair;

Georgian Government’s Parliamentary Secretary;

Representative of the Chief Prosecutor's Office;

Representative Judge of the Supreme Court;

Representative Judge of the Tbilisi Appeal Court;

Representative Judge of the Kutaisi Appeal Court;

Chair of the Human Rights and Civil Integration Committee of the Georgian Parliament;

The Public Defender or his/her representative;

Representative of the Bar Association of Georgia;

Representative of the Association of Law Firms of Georgia (ALFG);

Dean of the Faculty of Law of Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University;

Representative of the Coalition for Independent and Transparent Judiciary.

The relevant government decree was issued on February 20, 2017. matsne.gov.ge/ka/document/view/3586117

The composition of the commission was further expanded in comparison with the previous competition, while the examination stages for the selection of candidates remained the same.

In particular, the competition will take place in several stages: reception of applications and determination of their compliance; After the first stage, the successful applicants will undergo exams in foreign languages; Selected applicants will meet with the commission; Each commission members will interview candidates on the same day and evaluate them with points.

Taking into consideration awarded points, the secretariat of the commission will announce the average score for each candidate, based on which, 2 lists (according to the sex of the candidates) will be draw up. The process of calculating the average total score, can be attended by the committee members, as it was during the previous competition.

After reassessment of the indicated 2 lists, the final 5-candidate list will be drawn up, which will include candidates (both male and female) with the best results chosen from the both lists. According to the Council of Europe standards, the list should be gender balanced.

The secretariat will submit to the members of the commission the 5-candidate list, and later on behalf of the commission, its chairperson will present this list to the Georgian government. The government will choose from this list the final three candidates, whose identities and documents will be initially submitted to the Advisory Panel consisting of experts, which has been established based on the resolution of the committee of ministers of the council of Europe. The Panel will will issue a recommendation whether the candidates meet the requirements of the Convention. The list will be transferred to the appropriate committee, which will vote on the admissibility of the list and, in the case of a positive vote, will interview all three candidates. After the interviews, the committee will recommend one of them. At the end of the procedure, the list of 3 candidates will be submitted to the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly, which chooses the judge of the European Court of Human Rights.

Interested candidates’ application profile and candidacy are available here:

justice.gov.ge/UsefulInformation/CareerDetail/146; www.hr.gov.ge/JobProvider/UserOrgVaks/Details/41750