On May 25, 2015, the Public Defender of Georgia addressed the Parliament of Georgia with a legislative proposal regarding changes into the rule of consent to marriage of persons aged 16 to 18 for prevention of early marriages.

The prepared legislative proposal was based on results of the Public Defender’s work, tendencies revealed as a result of individual proceeding process and acuteness of the emerged subject.

By the legislative proposal, a change needs to be introduced into the Civil Code of Georgia according to which only the court will have an authority to issue consent to a marriage of persons aged 16 to 18. According to the current edition, minors have a right to register a marriage on the basis of parental consent. Given the fact that initiators of early marriages are often parents of minors and in some cases marriage is forced by them, change will enable us to prevent such cases and a court to discuss possibility of marriage of minors in case of serious reasons for the marriage.

By this initiative, the Public Defender of Georgia agreed to a recommendation of the Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) that calls on the State of Georgia to implement such changes.