▲Protesters against the Korokhnali mine in their protest tent in April. Photo: Mariam Nikuradze/OC Media.
Georgia’s General Prosecutor’s Office has begun criminal prosecution of three residents of the village Shukruti, in the mining town of Chiatura, in western Georgia.
On Tuesday afternoon, one of the demonstrators, Giorgi Neparidze, was contacted by an investigator from the police station who told him that he and two other demonstrators, Roman Megrelishvili and Malkhaz Labadze, had to come to the station for questioning.
‘Our answer was that we do not avoid the questioning, [but we demanded that] we be questioned in the presence of the magistrate judge’, Giorgi Neparidze told OC Media.
The three men are being charged with Article 226, organisation of or participation in group activity disrupting public order.
The lawsuit filed by the Prosecutor General accuses the three individuals of disrupting the operation of mines in Korokhnali and Shukruti by organising protests at the mines’ entrances.
The protest tent outside the Korokhnali mine in July. Photo: Mariam Nikuradze/OC Media.
If found guilty, Neparidze, Megrelishvili, and Labadze face up to three years in prison, a fine, 120-180 hours of community service, up to two years of corrective labour, or six months to two years of house arrest.
Georgian Manganese has been accused by locals of sending a group of men to the entrance of the Korokhnali Mine on 20 July to violently disperse a protest outside the mine and reopen it by force.
The mine has been closed for over four months after residents of the nearby village of Shukruti began blockading the entrance. Residents say the mine is causing their village to collapse, and they are demanding compensation.
The men eventually left and the protest resumed. Protesters claimed to have recognised senior managers from Georgian Manganese amongst the men who attacked them.
Residents of Shukruti have seen their houses collapse, roads damaged, and crops failing to grow for years due to mining by Georgian Manganese underneath their village.
Demonstrators have been demanding adequate compensation, and for that compensation to be evaluated by independent experts. As Kutateladze told OC Media, the compensation offered by the company is meagre and does not correspond to the damage that was done to the residents and their property.
A house in Shukruti damaged by land collapse, which locals claim is attributable to mining below the village. Photo: Mariam Nikuradze/OC Media.
The prosecutor’s office formally filed charges against Neparidze, Megrelishvili, and Labadze on Wednesday afternoon.
‘We are ready to go to prison’
The prosecutor’s office told OC Media on Wednesday that they would enquire regarding details of the case, but had failed to provide any information by the time of publication.
Giorgi Neparidze told OC Media that ‘such criminal approaches’ from the authorities provided them with ‘further motivation’ to protest.
‘All this serves to prevent people from raising their voices in defence of their home, their front door, their father’s and grandfather’s graves, and the village where they were born and grew up’, he said.
‘Probably, [Georgian Manganese] want to show this as an example to everyone, so that others don’t raise their voice […] But, we have already been through [such experiences]’, said Neparidze. ‘And if they have to arrest us, completely righteous people, [because we] protect our homes, we are ready to go to prison — we are innocent people, [completely] in the right’.
Neparidze added that the protesters had not violated the law by demonstrating, and had the right to do so.
According to him, prior to the protest, residents met with the company’s representatives, who asked for two weeks to assess the situation. As no-one contacted them during or following the deadline, the residents pitched their tents at the entrance to the mine on 13 March.
‘After that [two-week deadline], we officially stated to the Georgian Manganese company, that if they did not take effective steps to solve this problem […] we would be forced to begin a protest. We submitted an official application to the company, the local municipality, and the police department’.
‘On the 140th day [of the protest], we were charged, and today it’s been 141 days that we have a tent [set up] and [we are protesting] to protect our living environment’, said Neparidze. ‘We had no other choice, we signed an agreement in 2021 […] but unfortunately, they did not fulfil even one point of the signed agreement’.
Kutateladze stated that the situation in Chiatura is rapidly worsening, and becoming life-threatening.
The remains of a house damaged by land collapse in the village. Photo: Mariam Nikuradze/OC Media.
‘In Chiatura […] the houses are practically collapsing and whether residents will be alive tomorrow is under a serious question mark, because everything sinks into the mud and as time goes by the situation becomes more critical’.
Kutateladze added that he expected the situation to become ‘more tense’ in light of both broader political processes in the country and this case in particular.
‘Up until this stage, the state did not interfere so directly and there was no pressure from [state] services, and now, when it turns out that the state has agreed to these conditions, it is possible that the situation could develop in any way, and it is difficult to predict’, he said.
OC Media asked for clarification from Georgian Manganese, but their spokesperson did not return our calls or respond to messages.
The residents of Shukruti, a village in Georgia’s western Chiatura region, have been protesting mining under their village carried out by Georgian Manganese for years. In September, they relocated their protest to Georgia’s Parliament in Tbilisi, demanding that the government intervene in their dispute with the mining company.
Those protesting around the clock in front of parliament are constantly exposed to the elements as the weather grows colder, with at least six of th
After over a month on hunger strike, mostly on the steps of Georgia’s parliament, residents of the village of Shukruti are facing declining health and plummeting temperatures, with little hope of saving their village from destruction.
‘I don’t think I’ll witness my child growing up. I don’t have much energy left in me, maybe a few days? I don’t know’, says Giorgi Bitsadze, 33.
Bitsadze has always been the funny one, cracking endless jokes to friends, family, and anyone he happens to meet.
A company that has been linked to mining firm Georgian Manganese has claimed that people on hunger strike over the destruction of their homes are being ‘fully managed’ by NGOs and media organisations, including OC Media.
Chiatura Management Company stated on Thursday that they had ‘reasonable suspicions’ that the demonstrators were ‘backed by non-governmental organisations that are also directly connected to radical political parties, which in turn use the protests for their own narrow party i
Manganese mining company Magharoeli LLC has filed lawsuits against 30 residents in the village of Shukruti, demanding that the residents pay a total of ₾5.5 million ($2.1 million), as well as restricting their property rights.
The Shukruti residents’ lawyer, Lado Kutateladze, told OC Media that they only found out about the lawsuits on Monday, adding that this latest series of cases aimed to pressure Shukruti residents to end their protest against mining operations under their village.
