Pillay praises Georgia’s plan to introduce comprehensive human rights reforms Opening remarks by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay at a press conference in Tbilisi, Georgia, 21 May 2014 -- DisplayNews
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Pillay praises Georgia’s plan to introduce comprehensive human rights reforms Opening remarks by UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay at a press conference in Tbilisi, Georgia, 21 May 2014
“Good afternoon and thank you for coming.
I have just come to the end of my first visit to Georgia, where I have found much that is encouraging in terms of ongoing reforms, and learned much that is both alarming and depressing about the situation affecting people displaced from, and living in, Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Georgia. I will return to this issue later.
In Tbilisi, I held fruitful in-depth meetings with the President, the Prime Minister and the Ministers of Foreign Affairs, Justice, and Internal Affairs as well as with the Minister of Internally Displaced Persons, Minister of Corrections and other senior Government officials. I also held discussions with the Chief Justice, the Chairman of the Parliament, Georgia’s Public Defender and with civil society representatives.
The Government, led by the Prime Minister, has embarked on a wide range of reforms in the area of human rights and rule of law. One of the most important of these has focused on depoliticizing a dysfunctional judiciary and law enforcement system. This is a major task that will take time to complete, but it is widely recognized that there is already some progress. Until recently, 99.9 percent of defendants were being convicted in the criminal court. The acquittal rate is now starting to get more realistic, as the judges grow used to being more independent both from the Executive and from the prosecutors, for example by showing a greater inclination to demand that prosecutors properly justify their requests to place defendants in pre-trial detention.
The Government recognizes there is still a lot of work to do, not least in the area of training investigators, prosecutors and judges. Georgia’s free media can play an important role in highlighting miscarriages of justice and scrutinizing the progress of judicial reform, as no doubt will the country’s vibrant civil society organizations, which are well developed and making a very important contribution to the country’s reform programme. It is essential that trials are seen to be fair, transparent and free from any hint of political retribution.
An extraordinarily high number of criminal cases are still being resolved by plea-bargaining. The plea-bargaining system – coupled with the previous virtual certainty of being convicted if their cases came to court – has at times meant innocent defendants have been left with no option but to pay exorbitant fines demanded by the prosecutors, with minimal involvement of judges – a form of officially sanctioned extortion, that led to people losing their homes and businesses.
I urge the Chief Justice, and all judges, prosecutors and employees of the law enforcement agencies, to cooperate fully with the judicial reform process.
