The capacity building for the Assistant Judges on European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) standards and the respective case law on discrimination, hate crimes and hate speech including relevant data collection, continues with a training for court representatives from western Georgia which took place on 23-24 February 2023 in Borjomi. It builds on the previous trainings (July 2022, October 2021, July 2021, December 2019 and others).

The training focused on the discussions about the European Convention, the decisions of the ECtHR, the importance and obligation of producing joint data on hate crimes, manifestations of discrimination, and the scope of the negative and positive obligation of the state based on the case law of the Court.

Participants exchanged experiences in filling-up the special forms on hate crimes, which is important to record hate crime data correctly. This series of trainings on hate crime data collection contributes to making steps forward to improve hate crime data collection methodology in Georgia.

In line with ECRI recommendations and ECtHR judgements and respective Committee of Ministers decisions, Georgia needs to further improve protection from and response to hate motivated crimes and respective data collection and analysis. Since September 2018, the Council of Europe Office in Georgia continuously works with law-enforcement and justice system to promote advancement of countering hate motivated crimes and improving hate crime data collection methodology. Various trainings and working meetings were organised by the Council of Europe to support the process.

This activity is implemented in the framework of the Project “Promoting the Effective Protection of Equality and Non-Discrimination in Georgia”. The Project is funded through the Council of Europe Action Plan for Georgia 2020-2023.