1. This Submission is communicated by the European Human Rights Advocacy Centre (EHRAC), the Women's Initiatives Support Group (WISG) and the Georgian Young Lawyers' Association (GYLA) as the non-governmental organisations under Rule 9 (2) of the Rules of the Committee of Ministers (CM) for the supervision of the execution of judgments of Identoba and Others group of cases for consideration at the 1451st CM DH meeting on 6-8 December 2022. In addition, this communication also includes a Rule 9 (1) submission in respect of two cases in the Identoba and Others v. Georgia group, namely, Aghdgomelashvili and Japaridze v. Georgia and Women's Initiatives Supporting Group and Others v. Georgia.
2. The case of Aghdgomelashvili and Japaridze v. Georgia (Application no. 7224/11, judgment of 8 October 2020) concerned a police raid on the office of the Inclusive Foundation (an LGBTQI organisation) in Tbilisi in December 2009. During this raid, police officers subjected the applicants to homophobic and transphobic insults, threats, and humiliating strip searches. In its judgment, the Court found both a substantive and a procedural violation of Article 3 (the right not to be subjected to torture and inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment) in conjunction with Article 14 (prohibition of discrimination) of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR). The case is subject to the enhanced procedure as part of the Identoba group of cases.
3. The case of Women's Initiatives Supporting Group and Others v. Georgia (Application nos. 73204/13 and 74959/13, judgement of 16 December 2021) concerned an attack by a mob on LGBTQI demonstrators on 17 May 2013 – the International Day Against Homophobia – in central Tbilisi. In its judgment, the Court found a violation of Article 3 (prohibition of inhuman or degrading treatment) in conjunction with Article 14 (prohibition of discrimination) of the ECHR both on account of the authorities' failure to protect the peaceful demonstrators from homophobic and transphobic aggression and of the ensuing inadequate investigation.
4. It is noted that the Government of Georgia has made no updated action plan or report on this group at the time this submission is made.
5. This Submission complements previous Rule 9.2 submissions of 16 November 2016 (the 2016 CSO submission)[1], 10 May 2018 (the 2018 CSO submission)[2], 2 August 2019 (the 2019 CSO submission)[3], 10 August 2020 (the 2020 CSO Submission)[4], 22 October 2021 (the CSO Submission)[5] and GYLA's submission on 14 April 2022.[6]
Read or download the submission
