Democracy & Freedom Watch

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgian billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili plans on setting up a new political party in the beginning of February, ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The President pardoned 114 convicts today, according to the Minister of Corrections and Legal Assistance. 75 prisoners, four ...

First of all, I welcome member of parliament Mr. Gia Tortladze’s pathos to research Russian capital’s influence on the Georgian ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Representatives of the media, press distributors and other supporters gathered Friday in front of the Holiday Inn ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The government says that the political partners of billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili won’t have to return the money ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Lawmakers in the Georgian capital seem to have changed a law after it was signed by the ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Democracy activists and rights groups descended on president Saakashvili's palace in Tbilisi's Avlabari district Thursday to protest ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The Georgian businessman Bidzina Ivanishvili, listed by Forbes as the world’s 185th richest, could become stateless, after ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgian TV stations have released information about who owns them. It has long been a general impression, but ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Giorgi Tsagareishvili, chairman of the faction Unity for Justice and the member of the Free Democrats accuses ...

The US Embassy has released a statement regarding the changes to the Georgian Electoral Code and the legislation regarding campaign ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The Georgian president has signed the law about political associations of citizens, which imposes restrictions on campaign ...

Georgia has increased its military presence in the International Security Assistance Force in Afghanistan making it the biggest non-NATO contributor ...

Pressure for democratic transformation and modernization challenges Georgia from three main “flanks”: Internal stability – that was not a matter ...

Yesterday Parliament of Georgia passed a law which in fact outlaws political activity. Furthermore, to a degree it even outlaws ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Several authoritative non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in Georgia consider the retrospective powers of a new law amendment unconstitutional ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The political partners of the Georgian tycoon turned opposition leader will have to return the money they ...

Despite the fact that the Ministry of Corrections, Probation and Legal Assistance declared the reform of the penitentiary health care ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The ruling party in Georgia has postponed until spring to decide how to monitor the media before ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - As a bundle of election related bills are up for final review in parliament, it became clear ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Tuesday Georgia's new election system should have been passed in parliament, but the package of bills was ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Tbilisi City Court has declared partially invalid a decree issued by President Mikheil Saakashvili on October 11 ...

The government’s response to police violence on May 26, 2011, was clearly insufficient and inadequate and encourages a syndrome of ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - A businessman has decided to appeal a court decision given today which upholds president Mikheil Saakashvili's decision ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Will a city court in Georgia dare to go against the country’s president? By Tuesday afternoon this ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Three of the journalists who were beaten and shot by police on May 26, 2011, will be ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The Georgian businessman Bidzina Ivanishvili has renounced his Russian citizenship. This comes while there is only one ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The river which runs through Tbilisi might have its waters levels lowered, because a Turkish power company ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Tbilisi City Court will today announce its decision about compensation for the journalists who were beaten and ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - A large crowd gathered Saturday on Gudiashvili square in Tbilisi to protest against City Hall’s plans to ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - A Georgian opposition parliamentarian who asked authorities to map out how opposition parties receive their funding, has ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Givi Targamadze, chairman of Parliament's Defense and Security Committee, states that the government should use the national ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - From next year, Georgian theatres will refuse to accept help from billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili, culture minister Nika ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - In spite of early reports of three dead, five people actually died when police raided and dispersed ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Editor of newspaper Rezonansi Eliso Chapidze (pictured) and a group of media workers Friday submitted a bill ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Ten months before Georgia is to hold parliamentary elections, there is still distrust towards how the national ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Today several laws are up for revision which will change Georgia's election system and set the ground ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili had a conflict of interest when revoking a businessman’s citizenship, lawyers argued in ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Citizens of Georgia will be allowed to apply for an alternative service to the military, based on ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - President of Georgia, Mikheil Saakashvili, is embarking on a bold new plan to repair the teeth of ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Belgian veteran politician Wilfried Martens says he supports the party of Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili, the National ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The businessman who is trying to claim power in Georgia has a plan for what to do ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Tbilisi City Court 10 am today continued hearing the case of businessman Bidzina ivanishvili and his wife ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The government in Georgia is planning to make it illegal for human rights groups to let their ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - One of the chain of newspapers outlets in Tbilisi tell of a more than 80% drop in sales. ...

A conference of the Georgian national platform of the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum took place in Tbilisi, in the ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgia will have 6.2% growth in the economy in 2011. But the prices will have increased 10.5%. In ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgian workers have almost no job security due to a weak labor code. This is a conscious ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgian media workers Monday continued the campaign to raise awareness of the pressure they are coming under ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgia will not increase the number of members of parliament. Raising the number of MPs was one ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The authorities in Georgia moved with lightening speed and acted on assumptions when revoking a businessman’s citizenship ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - An opposition lawmaker aligned with Bidzina Ivanishvili calls for the government to go through the financial activities ...

Two weeks ago I decided to express in writing my humble personal opinion on the practice of freedom of information ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The evicted Georgian TV journalists are keeping alive an emergency schedule, while taking to the streets again ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - At 2 pm today the courtcase which could decide Georgia’s future continues. The question before Tbilisi City ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - An attack on one is an attack on all. That’s the principle for a new organization formed ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Two of Mikheil Saakashvili's ministers say he won’t cling on to power as prime minister after he ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Today many Georgian newspapers are running the same slogan on their frontpage: "President Saakashvili, don't kill the ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - For the second year in a row, the organization behind a Georgian journalistic ethics charter was unable ...

Georgia with all its successes and challenges, once again is becoming a significantly important case for the USA and the ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - After an eighteen year long struggle, Russia on Friday finally signed the document which formally makes it ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Eric Rubin, US Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs says that the United ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili Friday asked the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) for permission to send one ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Journalists working for an embattled Georgian TV station today called for solidarity and announced that they will ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Irakli Alasania, the leader of the Free Democrats and front man of the strongest opposition bloc in ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The staff of an independent TV station in Georgia are keeping alive its broadcasts from a radio ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The Georgian Minister of Regional Development is sure that the new Georgian parliament building (pictured) will be ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - An opposition lawmaker has accused a Georgian politics channel of having been pressured by the government to ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Public figures continue coalescing around a Georgian billionaire businessman who recently decided to go into politics and ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - A Georgian magazine is increasing the pressure on Transparency International and asks its headquarters to cut one ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The opposition leader Alla Dzhioyeva in Georgia’s breakaway republic South Ossetia is calling for supporters to return ...

Almost a century ago an English judge, Lord Chief Justice Hewart, pronounced his famous aphorism: “… it is not merely ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The European Union’s foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton is going to confront the Georgian government about the ...

According to the EU Charter of Fundamental rights, an integral part of European values is that the government protects the ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - An oppposition parliamentarian says the physical attack against his son was politically motivated. Giorgi Tsagareishvili, representive of the ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - A Georgian parliamentarian warns that a statement from Russia's chief security adviser could signal Russian military action of the ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The businessman Bidzina Ivanishvili is to form an election bloc and aims at running in next year’s ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - A Georgian weekly magazine wants Transparency International to retract parts of a report which criticizes it for ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - A journalist working for the Georgian online television Presage.tv has left her job, saying businessman Bidzina Ivanishvili ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgian media is at the mercy of a murky network of friends that extends into both government ...

Georgia’s ombudsman has published a new report which lays out the situation in the country’s detention centers, saying the situation ...

The Foreign Relations Committee and the Diaspora and Caucasus Issues Committee of Georgia’s parliament has made a joint statement regarding ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Another surprise bill about election reform made its way to parliament Monday, making it clear that the ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Lawyers representing a Georgian businessman and his wife twice asked the judge to be taken off a ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgia’s Interior Ministry will pay compensation to journalists who went to court for injuries they suffered when ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgian billionaire businessman Bidzina Ivanishvili says the time has come for ‘real Euro-Atlantic integration and not an ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The brother and widow of one of Georgia’s most popular politicians in the early 2000s were both ...

The entry of a new political force into the Georgian political landscape in the autumn 2001 has focused the spotlight ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The opposition in South Ossetia won't call off their demonstration on the main square, because they claim ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Over a thousand people enjoyed a sunny Tbilisi today outside the old Philharmonic, where a new opposition ...

Defense and police get 19 % of the total state budget next year. This represents a quarter of direct appropriations ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Gradually the ground rules for next year’s election are being laid as parliament has begun a new ...

Human Rights Day is celebrated on December 10. In order to mark the celebration, I would like to offer the ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - South Ossetian leader Eduard Kokoity today resigned as part of a deal with the opposition which ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The pressure group Georgian Young Lawyers Association (GYLA) warns that a new, narrower definition of what it ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Demonstrations are continuing on Tskhinvali’s main square, as the negotiations are stalled. Yesterday evening, a Russian news ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgians are discussing how to read the first polls done after a popular businessman decided to join ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Six cars and a bus were shot at in Tskhinvali last night, according to the news agency ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - A court case which could decide the future of Georgia has been postponed due to a judge’s illness. Georgian ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Vice speaker of parliament in Georgia’s breakaway region South Ossetia says the current president Eduard Kokoity must ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The prison ministry in Georgia says about a prisoner with kidney problems who was beaten before and ...

TBILISI, DFWatch – Georgians might elect political newcomer Bidzina Ivanishvili if given the option, but the first polls after he ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - An opposition parliamentarian claims that the government of Georgia is involved in a scheme to force a ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Alexander Ankvab, the newly elected leader of Georgia’s breakaway region Abkhazia, says that it’s necessary to establish ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Alla Dzhioyeva, the candidate who apparantly won the so-called presidential elections in Georgia’s breakaway region South Ossetia, ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Two opposition blocs exchanged obscenities in parliament Tuesday over what to do about a controversial bill to ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Tuesday the house of the de facto Prosecutor General of South Ossetia was shelled, as the entire ...

Cases of Eviction of IDPs from different buildings by means of police have recently become rather frequent. With regard to ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The Concil of Europe's special commission about election reform has recommended that Georgia lets Bidzina Ivanishvili run ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The de facto president of Georgia’s breakaway republic South Ossetia, Eduard Kokoity, says what is currently taking ...

TBILSI, DFWatch - Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili wants to build a brand new city on the Black Sea shore near ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - According to the latest ranking from Transparency International, the perceived level of corruption in Georgia has improved ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The Supreme Court in Georgia’s breakaway region South Ossetia will Monday decide when to hear the case ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - National Security Council Secretary Giga Bokeria, who was involved in the Swiss meditated talks between Russia and ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - According to National Security Council Secretary Giga Bokeria ‘Georgia appeared as sensible and flexible partner of the ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - A new border monitoring force between Georgia and Russia will be put together by Switzerland. Sergi Kapanadze, Georgia’s ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Mamuka Glonti, producer in chief and co-founder Maestro TV, has left his post. He announced this on ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgia has concluded an advantageous deal with two Israeli businessmen. Simultaneously president Saakashvili pardons Roni Fuchs and ...

In September 2011,Georgiaopenly announced its aspirations to become a part of Open Government Partnership.  Unfortunately,Georgia’s population is not aware of ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - National Security Council Secretary Giga Bokeria claims that there is a confrontation between clans in so-called South ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Georgian billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili promises to support and help Georgian print media. Lasha Tugushi, editor in-chief of the daily ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Prime Minister Nika Gilauri recently claimed that Georgia is number one tourism country in the South Caucasus ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Part of the population in Georgia’s breakaway region of South Ossetia will boycott the Russian elections for ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Answering questions on his Facebook page late this week, businessman Bidzina Ivanishvili said he will 'fundamentally reform' ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - A famous Georgian lawyer is in his sixth day of hunger strike, protesting against the lack of ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Zaza Gabunia, representative of the opposition Christian Democrats in Tbilisi City Council, claims that ‘the dismantling the ...

He scaled the 3 meter wall in the early morning dusk and bolted into the yard as effortlessly as a panther. ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The siege of a Tbilisi TV station is over. Producer Mamuka Glonti finally left after being holed ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Journalists, NGO representatives, politicians and other supporters Thursday gathered in front of the Maestro building to support ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - Tbilisi City Hall denies that the tender process to install new kiosks around the Georgian capital is ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The sudden attacked on an independent TV station in Tbilisi was carried out by an opposition politician ...

TBILISI, DFWatch - The producer and core personnel at Maestro were still holding out Thursday morning, marking 24 hours of ...