Georgia’s prosecutor’s office has frozen the bank accounts of seven civil society organizations, accusing them of “sabotage” in connection with mass protests in 2024.
In a statement, the office said Tbilisi City Court approved its motion to seize the accounts, alleging the groups funded equipment used during violent clashes with police.
“The investigation has established that the provision of equipment to protest participants who committed violent acts against law enforcement officers was carried out in a coordinated manner, including with funding from non-governmental organizations,” the statement read.
According to prosecutors, the funds were used to buy “special masks, protective glasses, face shields, pepper spray, and other equipment,” allegedly used by demonstrators during confrontations with police.
Several NGOs told OCCRP reporters they only learned of the move from the prosecutor’s office statement. Groups affected include the Civil Society Foundation and the Institute for Development of Freedom of Information.
Eduard Marikashvili, chair of the Tbilisi-based Georgian Democracy Initiative, a human rights organization, called the decision “illegal” stressing it “represents persecution of organizations independent from the government, as well as an attempt to silence them.”
“This is another wave of repression on the authoritarian path that the Georgian Dream has imposed on Georgia and its people,” he told OCCRP.
In a public statement, the NGO Sapari, which works on women’s rights and combating gender-based violence, said the allegations are “entirely baseless and defamatory.”
“With this decision, the Georgian Dream stopped helping hundreds of women and children – victims of violence. Ivanishvili's regime is an enemy to the Georgian people and Georgian non-governmental organizations,” Sapari Executive Director Baia Pataraia told OCCRP.
Tamta Mikeladze, head of the Social Justice Center in Tbilisi, wrote on Facebook that the move “practically means institutional and financial paralysis of the organizations.”
“‘Georgian Dream’ wants us to stop supporting citizens and social groups. Let us no longer expose their crimes and no longer build solidarity within society,” she added.
The prosecutor’s office froze the accounts of five other civil society organizations on similar charges earlier, on March 17.
