The Georgian Young Lawyers’ Association (GYLA) is responding to the information, publicized by the Kakheti Information Center, relating to the facts of pressure upon the media representatives. The June 23, 2015 article “The Journalists are Threatened to be Killed because of Publicizing the Caricatures” says that the journalists are being threatened.
The extract from the article: “if you do not erase those caricatures, if you continue this offence, I swear to Allah that your blood will be shed. I swear to the god that you do not believe in, I will take your head off with my own hands. I am sure that your blood is more precious than the ink of your pen,” – the targets of this threat are the journalists of the Azeri web-page renessans.ge, operating in Georgia. The author of the threat is the citizen of Georgia, the chairperson of the Marneuli Imam Ali charity fund – Javid Gurbanov.
The web-page renessans.ge was created by the ethnically Azeri citizens of Georgia in January 2015. “The goal of the project is to increase topicality of the problems, existing in the Azeri settlements, supporting civic engagement and integration.”
After the publication of the information, we talked to one of the journalists of the internet outlet – Aida Tagieva. According to the journalist, the threats were caused due to the caricature, published in their outlet, which reflects young journalists that broke through the cage with the books in their hands and went out. According to her, this is the cage and not the mosque. However, because of this caricature, the citizen of Georgia, the chairperson of the Marneuli Imam Ali charity fund – Javid Gurbanov, sent the threatening messages to the publicist of the site – Eynar Makhmudov, journalist Aydin Yusibova and editor Nugzar Japarov. According to the journalist, they have the records to prove this.
After our telephone discussion with Aida Tagieva we were informed that the journalist has addressed the investigative body and she has already been summoned for additional information.
GYLA welcomes the fast response of the investigative bodies and calls upon them to ensure fast, comprehensive and objective investigation on this case, as well as to ensure physical safety of the journalists and protect them from any possible obstruction or illegal influence.
GYLA expresses its readiness to protect the rights of the journalists and to represent their interests in both the investigative bodies, as well as before the court.
