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censorship

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Composite image. Tamar Shvelidze/OC Media
censorship

Abusive ‘private’ lawsuits: Georgia’s government SLAPPs its critics 

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Georgian officials and those associated with them are increasingly using private lawsuits to conduct what critics claim are systemic public attacks on journalists and activists, and so silence their critics free from public scrutiny.  In May 2024, an investigation by opposition-leaning TV channel Pirveli claimed that a business group owned by the father of Georgia’s current ruling party chair and former prime minister, Irakli Garibashvili, had received a business contract that appeared aimed a

Georgian broadcasters told to remove Zurabishvili attack ads
censorship

Georgian broadcasters told to remove Zurabishvili attack ads

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Georgia’s National Communications Commission (GNCC) has ordered broadcasters to stop airing three attack ads aimed at presidential candidate Salome Zurabishvili. The commission told broadcasters the adds, one of which calls Zurabishvili a traitor, violate Georgian legislation. On Tuesday, Tamta Muradashvili, a lawyer for opposition-leaning TV channel Rustavi 2, published a letter the station received from the commission on Facebook. The GNCC is the official body regulating broadcast and ele

‘Censorship’ of queer films at Armenian festival sparks outrage
Armenia

‘Censorship’ of queer films at Armenian festival sparks outrage

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Armenia’s Golden Apricot International Film Festival has been criticised amid reports that they ‘censored queer movies’ and other films featuring controversial topics. According to queer rights group PINK Armenia, the festival was set to include, among others, two movies which discuss queer rights, but these were removed from the screening list. Listen to me: untold stories beyond hatred, a documentary, and Apricot groves, a fiction film, were scheduled to be screened under the ‘Armenians

Kabardino-Balkaria’s code of silence
censorship

Kabardino-Balkaria’s code of silence

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The media in Kabardino-Balkaria parrots an extremely rosy picture of the republic. However, journalists and activists almost all admit privately — that with an eye towards the Kremlin (and Kadyrov’s growing army next door in Chechnya) — freedom of speech has been utterly decimated, and controversial topics go completely unreported. Of the two or three independent print media outlets that appeared in Kabardino-Balkaria on the wave of democratisation more than 20 years ago, only Gazeta Yug

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