Government announces handover of state-owned residential property to IDP ownership

The Government of Georgia on Monday announced it would transfer 342 residential premises currently occupied by 337 internally displaced families across the country to their formal ownership. 

IDPs will receive flats in capital Tbilisi, the central city of Gori, as well as the eastern city of Gardabani, the western cities of Zugdidi and Batumi and the Tskaltubo resort, and Marneuli in the south in their legal ownership.

The announcement follows last week’s launch of the construction of blocks with 2,400 flats for IDPs in Tbilisi, in a ₾245 million ($96.85mln) project set to complete by late 2025.

Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili also announced other residential projects would house 1,700 families in Zugdidi, 800 in the central-eastern city of Rustavi, 700 in the western hub city of Kutaisi and 150 in the central resort town of Borjomi.

He also highlighted 30,000 IDP families - about 100,000 people - had been provided accommodation under the Georgian Dream Government since 2012.

More than 250,000 Georgian citizens became internally displaced or refugees following the conflict in the country’s north-western, Russian-occupied Abkhazia region in the early 1990s, with another 30,000 forced to abandon their homes in the country’s occupied central region of Tskhinvali (South Ossetia) following Georgia’s 2008 conflict with Russia. The latter were mostly provided accommodation in settlements near Tbilisi.