CoE releases its conclusion on execution of European Court’s verdict on Georgia’s Ex-official Merabishvili

The Committee of Ministers of the Council of Europe has released its conclusion on the execution of the 2017 judgement of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) on ex-Interior Minister of Georgia Ivane Merabishvili, which ruled that the imprisonment of the latter was fair but Merabishvili’s rights were violated in a certain situation. 

• Read more about the cases involving Merabishvili here. 

The case concerned the arrest and pre-trial detention of Merabishvili in 2013 [under the Georgian Dream leadership] and his complaint that there had been ulterior purposes behind these measures.

Merabishvili namely alleged that the arrest and the pre-trial detention had aimed to remove him from the political scene, and that the Chief Prosecutor’s Office had attempted to use his detention as leverage to pressure him to provide information about other unrelated cases.

The ECHR said in its judgement that Merabishvili’s pre-trial detention had not principally been meant to remove him from Georgia’s political scene.

The Georgian Justice Ministry says that the Committee of Ministers did not consider the issue of Merabishvili's release at all. Photo: Justice Ministry press office. 

However, the court concluded that the predominant purpose of that restriction had changed over time.

While in the beginning that purpose had been the investigation of offences based on a reasonable suspicion, later on the predominant purpose became to obtain information about [former Georgian Prime Minister Zurab] Zhvania’s death and [former Georgian President Mikheil] Saakashvili’s bank accounts”, the verdict read.

The court held unanimously that there had been no violation of the right to liberty and security.

The ECHR ruled that there was a violation of Article 18 (limitation on use of restrictions on rights) towards Merabishvili.

The court held, by nine votes to eight, that Georgia must have paid Merabishvili €4,000 for non-pecuniary damage.

On its recent conclusion on the execution of the judgement the Committee of Ministers welcomed that Merabishvili had an opportunity to familiarise himself with the materials of the renewed investigation on his possible taking out of a cell [to make an influence on him] in 2013.

The committee also welcomed the decree of the Minister of Justice on extending the current five-day time-limit for retention of surveillance videos to 30 days in all prisons.

The committee noted “with concern” that the domestic court upheld the decision of the Prosecutor’s Office at this stage of the investigation not to grant the applicant victim status [regarding the episode of taking out of a cell]. The committee  requested the re-checking of the status.

The Georgian Justice Ministry says that the committee did not consider the requests of Merabishvili’s lawyer at all [made two times] to discuss the issue of the release of ex-Interior Minister.

See the full text of the committee’s conclusion here.