Identoba and Women’s Initiatives Supporting Group planned to organize a silent demonstration in front of the Parliament in Tbilisi on May 17th. The demonstration aimed at highlighting the problem of homophobia in the Georgian society. Tbilisi City Hall, as well as the relevant police departments were informed about the demonstration beforehand. Before the demonstration, the organizers several times met with the police officials, which convinced us that they would be able to protect participants from the violence of counter-demonstrators.
Several days before the demonstration, some extremist groups as well as some representatives of the Georgian Orthodox Church, began to mobilize people for the counter-demonstration. They started spreading fliers, which called on all the churchgoers and believers, to stand up against the “gay parade” in Georgia. There were several video statements made by priests circling in the social media.
Two days before the demonstration, The Council of Religious Confessions issued a statement, which further fuelled the aggression of people whose attitude was already negative towards LGBT community and their supporters. On May 16, the Patriarch of Georgia addressed Tbilisi City Hall asking to ban the LGBT community from holding the demonstration.
To answer the confusion that had been created around the demonstration, Prime Minister of Georgia, as well as ministers of Justice and Foreign Affairs, made open statements about freedom of assembly and association, emphasizing that it is the government’s primary responsibility to ensure the access to this right for every group.
On May 17th one part of the participants appeared on the spot earlier than previously agreed, although the street was already occupied by counter-demonstrators. Police tried to evacuate the participants with the buses that were kept nearby especially for this purpose; however, they were unable to stop counter-demonstrators. Photo and video footage shows clearly, how clergymen not only encouraged their followers’ violent outbursts, but also personally participated in the acts of violence.
The second part of the participants was unable to reach the point where the demonstration was supposed to be held and was also unable to reach the evacuation buses. Because of this, they found themselves surrounded by counter-demonstrators from all the sides. The organizers tried to call and reach relevant police officials, but in vain.
Later, the demonstration was joined by UN representatives, and only after they showed their badges, the policemen started to act and evacuated the participants into one of the nearby buildings. Later, the participants were escorted into a minivan, in order to be evacuated from the premises. The counter-demonstrators attacked the minivan, broke its windows and wind shield, threw stones at activists sitting inside the minivan, tried to grab them and drag them out of the van. In this case, police turned out to be quite efficient and did not let the counter-demonstrators prevent the minivan from moving forward. Two police officers followed the minivan until it reached a safe place. The number of people injured during the demonstration amounts to 15, among them there are journalists and police officers.
The violence that took place on today’s demonstration triggered immediate response, although, despite the existing photo and video footage, none of the aggressors have been arrested. Counter demonstrators continue to move within the city and attack people of “suspicious” appearance. We call on the government to timely stop the violence towards LGBT people and efficiently investigate all the criminal offenses that took place on May 17th demonstration, giving them the qualification of hate crimes. We demand that the people, who in the past few days regularly called on the counter demonstrators to gather and attack the LGBT demonstration, are held accountable for those crimes.