investigation

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Feature Stories

Inside Georgia’s textile industry: Part III — Control

by Tamuna Chkareuli

•17 min read

Robots ferry containers of Nike shirts across the factory floor while plasma screen televisions drive workers to labour ever faster. In the third and final part of OC Media’s exposé on Georgia’s textile industry, investigative journalist Tamuna Chkareuli infiltrates a high-tech factory in Poti. [In this multi-part series, OC Media went inside Georgia’s factories for a first-hand account of the working conditions. Read Part I and Part II] Imagine you’re a woman in her forties from the indus

Feature Stories

Inside Georgia’s textile industry: Part II — Undercover

by Tamuna Chkareuli

•22 min read

Threats, corruption, nervous breakdowns, and $4,000 coats. In part two of OC Media’s exposé on Georgia’s textile industry, investigative journalist Tamuna Chkareuli goes undercover at the Geo-M-Tex factory in Tbilisi. [In this multi-part series, OC Media went inside Georgia’s factories for a first-hand account of the working conditions. Read Part I here.] It was easy to get a job at the Geo-M-Tex factory. The Human Resources manager did not ask many questions — just briefly explained that a

abduction

The Afgan Mukhtarli case: an investigation stalled?

by Gulnur Kazimova

•6 min read

Since exiled Azerbaijani journalist Afgan Mukhtarli disappeared from Tbilisi, reappearing a day later in an Azerbaijani jail, suspicions of Georgian involvement in his kidnapping have remained. Mukhtarli himself has accused the Georgian government of complicity, and while this is a charge they deny, local rights groups are becoming impatient with the pace and transparency of the official investigation into his disappearance. On 6 February, imprisoned Azerbaijani journalist Afgan Mukht

The Georgian Co-Investment Fund’s rendition of planned Sololaki Hotel overlooking Tbilisi.

accountability

Investigation | Who are Panorama Tbilisi’s mystery backers?

by Volodymyr Soboliev

•7 min read

Since its announcement by billionaire then–Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili, the Georgian Co-Investment Fund has began to reshape Georgia’s capital. OC Media set out to unmask the backers of the project, but with the money channelled via murky offshores, this proved to be somewhat impossible. In September 2016, Georgian Prime Minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili attended the cornerstone laying ceremony for Heidelberg Cement’s new plant in Kaspi. The event was intended to emphasise the multina

activism

Khadija Ismayilova: Fear reigns in Azerbaijan

by Volodymyr Soboliev

•4 min read

Khadija Ismayilova is not only Azerbaijan’s most famous journalist, but the country’s most famous woman. Her loud and persistent investigations of corrupt dealings in the country, and her publications, in which she names president Ilham Aliyev, members of his family, and other high-ranking officials in connection to those dealings, have not endeared her to the authorities. An entire campaign was waged to discredit Ismayilova with the goal of, she supposes, forcing her to quit her investi