456 internally displaced families offered new Tbilisi homes

Hundreds of people displaced from Georgia’s breakaway regions, forced to flee their homes and live in sub-standard collective centres, have received new housing through a Government initiative to rehome vulnerable citizens.

This week 456 internally displaced families found themselves on a list of people who were granted new homes in newly built apartment blocks in Georgia’s capital Tbilisi.

Of these 330 flats were located at the Olympic village in Tbilisi, built for the European Youth Olympic Festival that took place in the capital last summer.

Minister of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) from the Occupied Territories, Accommodation and Refugees Sozar Subari said his agency would release an additional list naming 105 other families who would be gifted new apartments before the end of this year.

Subari said the rehoming project would continue in 2016 too; next year plans were to rehome 600 other IDPs.

The Government-led rehousing project launched on November 1, 2014.

A 2013 United Nations (UN) survey revealed many Georgian IDP collective centres did not meet adequate living standards. To get IDPs into adequate housing, the Georgian Government purchased more than 1,500 houses. These will soon be gifted to eligible families in Georgia’s regional areas.

According to the UN Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC), there were up to 206,600 IDPs registered by in Georgia at the end of 2013.

About 45 percent of IDP’s lived in collective centres. Of this, the majority of housing (70 percent) did not meet minimum shelter standards, lacked adequate privacy, lacked access to water, proper insulation and functional sewage systems, stated the Gap analysis of the UN Refugee Agency.