Georgian Deputy Foreign Minister: despite ongoing occupation, Georgian Government continues to address human rights violations in occupied regions

Despite the ongoing occupation, the Georgian Government continued to respond to human rights violations in the Russian-occupied regions, including by raising the issue at the international level, said on Monday Khatuna Totladze, the Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of Georgia, during the discussion of the Georgian National Report on the State of Human Rights in Georgia (2021-2025) within the framework of the UN Universal Periodic Review.

In her remarks, Totladze highlighted that the human rights and humanitarian situation in Russian-occupied regions was deteriorating day by day.

“Unfortunately, due to the illegal occupation of the Abkhazia and Tskhinvali regions of Georgia as a result of a military aggression by Russia, we are deprived of the opportunity to implement all the said measures in the occupied regions. The human rights and humanitarian situation in both occupied regions is deteriorating day by day. Human rights violations committed by the occupying power in the said region include, among others, violations of the rights to life and education in the native language, torture and inhuman treatment, illegal detentions and discrimination on ethnic grounds”, Totladze said.

“The grave human rights situation in the occupied territories is particularly worrying, given that international human rights mechanisms are not allowed to enter these regions. Russia, as an occupying power and a state exercising effective control, is fully responsible for human rights violations in the occupied regions, as confirmed by the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights and the International Criminal Court”, she concluded.