On March 13, 2015, the Public Defender’s Office of Georgia were visited by representatives of the delegation of the UN Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment or punishment who are in Georgia with an official visit. The key issues discussed at the meeting held with First Deputy Public Defender Paata Beltadze and Parliamentary Secretary of the Public Defender Ekaterine Popkhadze included importance of establishment of the independent investigative mechanism and issues of its mandate. They also discussed the situation in Georgia with regards to investigation of facts of torture and inhuman treatment.

The First Deputy Public Defender provided information to the members of the delegation on the situation in closed institutions and changes that were introduced for effective operation of the National Preventive Mechanism; a renewed expert group of the National Preventive Mechanism that was selected through the competition; presented working principles of the Advisory Council of the National Preventive Mechanism and results of the conducted monitoring. At the meeting, special attention was paid to the legislative proposal of the Public Defenders that envisages granting the right to make photo and video recordings in closed institutions to members of the National Preventive Mechanism.

At the meeting, it was also emphasized that various positive changes were introduced against torture in Georgia. One of the main steps to be taken is to elaborate an action plan against torture. It was also noted that adoption of the plan is in its final stages although it was hereby mentioned that some problems still remained with respect to effective investigation of offences against human rights and freedoms committed by representatives of law enforcement agencies. Given all the above, the main recommendation of the Public Defender concerns establishment of the independent investigative commission and granting the National Preventive Mechanism the right to make photo-video recordings which is successful practice in many European countries.