On April 25, 2017, the Public Defender of Georgia addressed the Chairman of the Parliament to speed up the consideration of the amendments aimed at strengtheningthe anti-discrimination legislation.[1] The Public Defender once again pointed out in the appeal that the comprehensive study of the cases of discrimination was prevented by the fact that the natural and legal persons of private law were not obliged to provide requested information to the Public Defender.

It is indicated in the appeal that the Public Defender reviewed an application, according to which, ethnic Georgian employees of a private company were subjected to alleged discriminatory treatment by the employers. During the study of the case, the employers did not fully issue requested information and refused to talk with the representative of the Public Defender; the information provided by the employers did not turn out to be sufficient to study the case of alleged discrimination. As a result, the Public Defender had to terminate proceedings due to lack of evidence.

The abovementioned is another proof that it is important to adopt the legislative amendments, importance of which had been repeatedly emphasized by the Public Defender and which, among other things, provide for the imposition of an obligation on private persons to provide requested information to the Public Defender,[2] in order to effectively struggle for equality.

The package of amendments submitted by the Public Defender also includes changes aimed at obliging private persons to present information about the measures taken by them for the implementation of the Public Defender’s recommendation, increasing the term for appealing to the court, strengthening the standard of the burden of proof and giving the Public Defender the opportunity to study a case during the administrative proceedings.

The abovementioned amendments to the legislation were implied in the Visa Liberalization Action Plan between the EU and Georgia as well, but the requirement has not been fulfilled.