Activity Details (ID# 5823)

Activity Synopsis

The general objective of the training seminar was to present to the judges and prosecutors from the regions of Georgia the general principles developed by the European Court of Human Rights concerning Article 10 of the ECHR and its application as regards defamation, insult, criticism of public figures, privacy, incitement to hatred, access to information, protection of sources, state secrecy and whistle-blowing.

Besides this general objective, there was also a particular practical objective to examine two case studies related to some of the explained subjects and prepared by the two CoE experts, namely Mr Basil ADER, lawyer, Paris Barr Association, Editor in Chief of the magazine «Legipresse», and Ms Thea TSOULOUKIANI, Lawyer at the Registry of the European Court of Human Rights.

The interest of the Georgian judicial authorities for the event was high – 11 judges and 9 prosecutors from the regions participated actively in the seminar. Some of judges had already participated in other CoE trainings on different ECHR articles.
 

The seminar was well organised. The CoE documents concerning freedom of expression, translated into Georgian with the help of the local Information and Documentation Centre of the CoE, were distributed to the participants (for instance, a selection of relevant ECHR cases or a selection of the CM of the CoE Recommendations related to freedom of expression and information).

Given that issues concerning defamation, privacy and criticism of public figures are very sensitive in Georgia, the participants were especially interested by the experts’ presentations on these specific topics. They discussed cases concerning defamation, privacy and criticism of public figures and similar cases in their country and compared the decisions with the European Court decisions. A special session was dedicated to other important topics for the Georgian context, such as access to information, protection of sources and state secrecy. Theoretical sessions were followed by work on practical hypothetical cases related to the addressed subjects.

Georgian judges were quite well informed about several principles concerning Article 10 and the Convention in general. At the same time, they confessed that the Convention is not applied on an every day basis. Some magistrates are still hesitant to clearly apply the standards of the European Court as concerns defamation or criticism of political figures. Georgian prosecutors were less aware of the ECHR case-law and principles, and they considered very useful this first training in the field.
 

At the end of the seminar, an evaluation questionnaire was distributed to the participants. According to the replies, most participants were interested in Article 10 case law and in the ECHR issues in general. They highly appreciated the level of the CoE experts. Most of the trainees felt encouraged to continue their education in the field of human rights protection. They suggested further follow-up activities, expressing their wish to continue this kind of trainings, in order to become more familiar with the ECHR and to be able to apply in their daily practice the principles developed in the case-law related to Article 10. They also expressed their interest in some other ECHR articles, such as the 5th, the 6th, the 9th and the 11th. 

Judges and prosecutors from the regions of Georgia

 

Mr Basil ADER, lawyer, Paris Barr Association, Editor in Chief of the magazine « Legipresse »
Ms Thea TSOULOUKIANI, Lawyer at the Registry of the European Court of Human Rights
 

Mr Eugen CIBOTARU, Media Division, Directorate General of Human Rights