Interior Ministry Ordered to Pay Damages to June 20 Protester

Luka Petriashvili, a man injured during the police dispersal of the June 20-21, 2019, anti-occupation demonstration has to be paid GEL 35,000 (USD 11,200) in damages, the Tbilisi City Court ruled on September 23. 

The court ordered the Interior Ministry to pay the claimant GEL 15,000 (USD 4,800) and GEL 20,000 (USD 6,400) in material and moral damages, respectively. Petriashvili was hit by a police rubber bullet during the dispersal of the rally and received facial fractures, his lawyer Beka Basilaia said.

Basilaia also hailed the Court’s decision and called on judges to deliver rulings in “drawn-out” cases involving other injured protesters.

Another lawyer in the case, Gvantsa Kvaratskhelia pointed out this was the first legal case won against the state over the June 20-21 developments. 

At least 240 people, including about 40 journalists and 80 police officers, were injured in the police dispersal of the anti-occupation rally outside the Parliament building on Rustaveli Avenue in Tbilisi. Tensions had flared in the capital after Sergei Gavrilov, Russian communist MP, addressed the Inter-parliamentary Assembly on Orthodoxy session held in the Georgian Parliament from the Speaker’s seat.

Also Read:

This post is also available in: ქართული (Georgian) Русский (Russian)