Georgia: Authorities Built Coordinated System To Crush Dissent and Entrench Power
In the country of Georgia, an Amnesty International report released June 15, 2026 documents how the judiciary and prosecution service have become integral to a coordinated state apparatus for suppressing dissent over a roughly 500-day crackdown. The report finds that judges arbitrarily imposed ruinous fines, administrative detention, and prison sentences in protest-related cases following unfair trials, with more than 150 people unjustly detained. Courts repeatedly declined to act on allegations of torture and ill-treatment raised by hundreds of protesters who appeared before them with visible injuries, while prosecutors moved against opposition figures and protesters rather than the officials responsible for abuses. Amnesty characterizes this as a deliberate, system-wide instrumentalization of legal institutions to entrench the ruling party’s power. The findings highlight the role of compliant judges and prosecutors in legitimizing repression and normalizing the erosion of fair-trial guarantees.