Day: January 29, 2024

Putin’s secret “Northern Dacha” on Lake Ladoga north of Saint Petersburg, adjacent to Finland. The security perimeter extends to 4km² within what is supposed to be a national park. The secure territory is twice the size of Monaco and features Pantsir-S1 air defense. pic.twitter.com/AsMxWMnMNN

— Igor Sushko (@igorsushko) January 29, 2024

U.S. Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin and several other Defense Officials are reported to currently be at the White House in discussions with President Biden about Planning and Preparations for Response Options against Iran and the Iranian-Backed Group, as Retaliation for last… pic.twitter.com/5zc72UoWvP

— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) January 28, 2024

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili has resigned from his post. He has just confirmed his resignation at a special briefing at the Government Administration. Referring to internal inter-party democracy, he said it’s necessary to “give others a chance”. He also said he had accepted an offer to become Chair of the Georgian Dream party.

“I would like to thank the founder and honorary chairman of our party, Mr. Bidzina Ivanishvili, the leadership and members of the party and Parliament, heads of ministries and all employees, employees of the government administration, all civil servants for their great support during my term as Prime Minister,” – Garibashvili said at the briefing.

Earlier in the day, the ruling party’s mouthpiece TV Imedi posted “exclusive information” about the expected exchange of posts between Irakli Kobakhidze and Irakli Garibashvili. Imedi TV also said that Georgian Dream plans to reshuffle the Cabinet of Ministers at the party congress scheduled for February 1.

On December 30, Bidzina Ivanishvili officially returned to politics for the third time, becoming “honorary chairman” of the “Georgian Dream” party. Speaking at the GD party congress, Ivanishvili said that the reason for his return was “to protect the excessively strong team from human temptation.”

In his first comments after the party congress on December 30, Ivanishvili said that the country’s Prime Minister would not be changed. Ivanishvili also said there would be no changes in the cabinet or within the ruling party.

On January 29, the Public Defender of Georgia Levan Ioseliani appointed a new Deputy Public Defender Irine Chikhladze who will coordinate and supervise the activities of the Department of Children’s Rights, the Gender Department, the Department of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the Equality Department and the Regional Division of the Public Defender’s Office.

The position became vacant when former Deputy Public Defender Natia Julakidze resigned in an unpublicized manner a few months ago. Julakidze had been appointed by Public Defender Ioseliani in April 2023 and her appointment had caused controversy, as she is a niece of Aleko Elisashvili, a party colleague of Levan Ioseliani of the Citizens’ Party. Asked to comment on this, Julakidze said that she would “certainly criticize her uncle if he made a discriminatory statement”.

As for the new Deputy Public Defender, Chikhladze has previously worked for United Water Supply Company of Georgia in 2020-2024, first as an Advisor to the Director in 2020-2021, and then from 2021 as the Head of the donor-funded Project Management Department. According to the Public Defender’s Office, she is also a visiting professor of competition law and European law at the Georgian National University (SEU).

According to the source, Irine Chikhladze worked in Munich (Germany) at the Department of Combating Terrorism and Money Laundering of the Bavarian Insurance Chamber. She was a member of the Board of the Association of Georgians in Germany, a young ambassador of Georgia to the Federal Republic of Germany.

In 2016 -2017, Chikhladze was a chief specialist at the Georgian National Energy and Water Supply Regulatory Commission, while in 2014-2016 she worked as an adviser of Legal and Methodological Support Department the Competition Agency of Georgia. She has also worked for the German Federal Antimonopoly Service (in Bonn) and the Office of the German Parliamentary Bureau (in Berlin).

She is a PhD student at the Faculty of Law of the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (LMU) and has received Master’s degree in law at the same university. She also has bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University (TSU).

Also Read:

• 11/12/2023 – Public Defender Addresses Human Rights Challenges in Georgia on the International Human Rights Day
• 08/12/2023 – Georgian Public Defender Visits Kyiv
• 17/05/2023 – Public Defender: Rights Situation of LGBT+ People Remains Serious Problem
• 17/02/2023 – Public Defender’s Office Slams Draft Law on Foreign Agents

On January 29, the Georgian Parliament held a working meeting between the representatives of the ruling party, the opposition and civil society on the Government’s action plan of measures to implement the European Commission’s nine conditions. The meeting was chaired by the Speaker of the Parliament, Shalva Papuashvili and the Chairman of the Georgian Dream party, Irakli Kobakhidze.

Ahead of the meeting, Shalva Papuashvili said that the agenda includes all the issues arising from the nine priorities, “with a special focus on the issues within the competence of the Parliament.”

The opposition party “Lelo” boycotted the meeting. Ana Natsvlishvili of Lelo said the party will present its own action plan tomorrow, adding: “Now is not the time for half-measures, sham trials and commissions, now is the time for quick, decisive action.”

The representative of the main opposition party UNM, Davit Kirkitadze, announced before the meeting that the party also plans to announce its own action plan, on which the civil society organizations have already been consulted.

Opposition comments after the meeting

Paata Manjgaladze, the representative of the “Reform Group”, in his comments after the meeting stated that “the representatives of Georgian Dream share the recommendations, notes and conditions of Europe at the level of speech and recognition. I don’t expect Georgian Dream to change the morals and start the process of de-oligarchization, electoral and judicial reform”. According to Manjgaladze, by participating in the meeting, the opposition has put an end to the ruling party’s “radical opposition” rhetoric and forced it to talk about and focus on reforms.

Mikheil Daushvili, the representative of the political group “For Georgia”, stated: “From what we heard at today’s meeting, Georgian Dream does not intend to implement substantive and structural reforms on such important issues as the electoral issue, the judiciary and anti-corruption reform.”

Roman Gotsiridze, the representative of the political group “Euro-optimists”, stated: “There are priorities that will never be fulfilled, which concern the reduction of levers related to the maintenance of power. There are priorities that will be partially fulfilled. There are also priorities that will be fulfilled because the EU itself has set low standards for them… In general, the essential and vital priorities, such as electoral reform, such as judicial reform, etc., these recommendations will of course not be implemented until this government is in place”.

Davit Kirkitadze, the representative of UNM, stated: “[The Georgian Dream] will try to oppose the [reforms] process in every possible way. The ultimate goal and task is to prevent them from doing so. At the end of the day, we should not give them the opportunity to say that any process, which in the end will be for the good of the Georgian people, was hindered by the opposition or by our non-participation. We are participating in this process, we will try to force the authorities to take these steps, and of course, if they don’t, we will come out and tell the public clearly and definitely”.

Teona Akubardia, the representative of the “Reform Group”, stated after the meeting: “It was mainly about the format, including specific visions and mood indicators. But if I were to tell you that this left me with any great expectations, that there will be any fundamental changes, that is not the case.” She also noted that the working groups will continue to meet on more specific issues.

Some of the most influential CSOs, including TI-Georgia, GYLA and ISFED, did not attend the meeting. According to Shalva Papuashvili, CSOs were invited to the meeting through the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Platform, which TI-Georgia, GYLA and ISFED had left. Papuashvili noted that these organizations had sent letters asking to attend the meeting individually, but they were refused and told that if they wanted to participate, they should do so through the platform.

After the meeting, Nino Chkhobadze, representative of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Platform, noted that civil society can’t be represented by the Platform alone. She called for more involvement of civil society organizations in the process of reform implementation and more participation at the level of transparent working groups.