Asida Shakryl (chp-apsny.org)
The Abkhazian human rights commissioner, Asida Shakryl, has condemned the treatment of ethnic Georgians from Abkhazia’s easternmost Gali District. A protest was held in Gali after the Abkhazian authorities closed the border with Georgian-controlled territory ‘to prevent the spread of swine flu’. [Read more…]
Russian-language textbooks used by Gali pupils issued in Moscow (Nino Gogua /OC Media)
With their new peace initiative, ‘A Step to a Better Future’, Georgia’s government hopes to tempt students from Abkhazia and South Ossetia to enrol in Georgian universities by letting them sit entrance exams in their ‘native language’. But for Abkhazia’s ethnic Georgians in Gali, banned from studying in Georgian there and whose Abkhaz language skills are far from native, the initiative does little to help.
Ketevan Tsikhelashvili serves as Georgia’s Minister for Reconciliation and Civic Equality (smr.gov.ge)
Ketevan Tsikhelashvili has served as Georgia’s State Minister for Reconciliation and Civic Equality, responsible for coordinating the country’s conflict resolution policy, since 2016. Tsikhelashvili sat down with OC Media to discuss the ministry’s successes and failures, her new peace initiative, and the barriers to and prospects for peace.
In the market in Gali, the vendors are ethnic Georgians, however the owners of their counters are Abkhaz, according to locals. (Nino Gogua /OC Media)
Jobs are hard to come by in Abkhazia’s eastern Gali District, according to the ethnic Georgians who predominantly make up the district’s population. They say that nepotism and discrimination, both direct and indirect, have made unemployment rife. Some go to Sukhumi to the city’s highly unsafe construction sites, while others are leaving for greener pastures.
Khurcha-Nabakevi Crossing Point before its Closure, 2015 (Special Report of Public Defender)
The human rights of communities in Abkhazia’s Gali District have been gradually deteriorating, according to a report by the Georgian Public Defender. The report focused on the effects of closures of border crossings. [Read more…]
