In February and April 2021, the Department of Human Rights Protection and Investigation Quality Monitoring of the Ministry of Internal Affairs conducted two training sessions on hate crime for 90 police officers in the Samtskhe-Javakheti region and the Autonomous Republic of Adjara. In March 2021, the Department organized an online meeting with the Public Defender's Council of Religions, which was also attended by the Centre for Tolerance and international and local non-governmental organizations. During the event, the Prosecutor's Office presented measures taken to combat crimes committed on the grounds of religious intolerance.
In June and July 2021, three trainings were co-organized by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and partner institutions. The first event was a hate crime training held for 20 Ministry employees responsible for territorial and structural units. Organized as part of a Council of Europe project, the training touched upon psychological and legal issues related to hate crime. Following this, 40 Ministry employees responsible for territorial and structural units participated in a four-day training organized by the UN OHCHR aimed at enhancing their understanding of discrimination and bias-motivated crime. Lastly, the Ministry of Internal Affairs co-operated with the Council of Europe to train 20 participants on discrimination, hate speech and the investigation of hate crimes. During the event, participants learned about bias indicators, investigative standards, and specific forms of discrimination, including on the grounds of sex, disability, race, nationality, ethnicity, religion and political views, among others.
In September 2021, the Ministry of Internal Affairs launched a HELP course on "Hate crime and hate speech" – an online distance learning course developed as part of the Council of Europe's project on "Fight against discrimination, hate crime and hate speech in Georgia". A total of 25 Ministry employees and 25 judges participated in the course. As part of the project, in December 2021, employees of the Ministry of Internal Affairs participated in a training focused on crimes motivated by anti-religious bias.
Finally, the High School of Justice conducted three training sessions on discrimination and hate crimes for 75 judges and court officials from the Tbilisi City Court, other district courts and the Tbilisi and Kutaisi Appellate courts.
Notable cases
Case 1: On 5 July 2021, the offices of the "Tbilisi Pride" and the "Shame" movement were attacked and vandalized by a mob of far-right demonstrators protesting against LGBTI Pride Week. The organizations' employees were chased into the streets, and at least two other people – a journalist associated with the LGBTI community and a cameraman – were physically assaulted. A number of other participants, including journalists, were attacked during various rallies. The Ministry of Internal Affairs condemned the hate-motivated acts and launched an investigation into the incident. More than 300 persons were interviewed and a number of individuals were charged with hate crimes.
Case 2: On 31 October 2021, a transgender woman and her colleague were stabbed with a knife by a man in a massage salon, resulting in the death of the transgender victim. In November 2021, the perpetrator was charged with murder and attempted murder motivated by bias based on gender identity. In July 2022, the Tbilisi City Court sentenced him to 12 years of imprisonment. An appeal process was ongoing at the time of publication of ODIHR's 2021 Hate Crime Report.
This category includes 58 hate crimes motivated by bias based on sexual orientation and 48 crimes motivated by bias based on gender identity.
This bias motivation includes offences committed with bias based on age, political or other views, social affiliation, other grounds of discrimination and discrimination on multiple grounds.
The Council of the European Union published relevant recommendations in its "ANNEX to the Proposal for a Council Decision on the position to be taken on behalf of the European Union in the Association Council established under the Association Agreement between the European Union and the European Atomic Energy Community and their Member States, of the one part, and Georgia, of the other part, on the adoption of the EU-Georgia Association Agenda".
The Council of Europe's Parliamentary Assembly published relevant recommendations in its “Alleged violations of the rights of LGBTI people in the Southern Caucasus”.
The European Parliament published relevant recommendations in its "Report on the implementation of the EU Association Agreement with Georgia".
The United Nations Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination (CERD) published relevant recommendations in its "Concluding observations on the combined ninth and tenth periodic reports of Georgia".
ODIHR recognizes Georgia's efforts to improve its hate crime recording and data collection and to make hate crime data public. This has led to a significant rise in the number of recorded hate crimes. However, ODIHR observes that Georgia would benefit from strengthening the inclusion of, collaboration with, and facilitating the work of civil society working to combat hate crimes and support victims.
ODIHR recalls that in Ministerial Council Decisions 9/09 and 13/06, OSCE participating States committed to taking a proactive and inclusive approach to facilitate the contribution of civil society in combating hate crimes. ODIHR stands ready to support Georgia in meeting its relevant commitments through the provision of comprehensive resources and assistance.