Rights defenders urge authorities to help Pankisi residents

Residents of the Pankisi Gorge face serious problems with infrastructure, medical care and drinking water; and they are restricted in mobility due to law enforcers' control, the NGO "Centre for Human Rights Training and Monitoring" has stated. Human rights defenders note that after protests against HPP construction, many projects scheduled for 2019 were suspended.

Residents of the villages of Duisi, Djokola, Birkiani and Omalov have faced problems that local authorities fail to solve, the NGO has stated.

In particular, all the villages of the Pankisi Gorge face the problem of drinking water pollution and shortage; there are no ambulance crews and fire-fighters in villages; roads are destroyed and unsafe. The NGO has called on the country authorities to help the population based on their needs.

Some of young people have left Pankisi, as they see no chances for progress there, as well as no social guarantees after the case of Temirlan Machalikashvili.

In the opinion of Tamta Mikeladze, the head of the above NGO, the main problem of local residents is that the authorities perceive them as a risk group, treating them as adherents of radical Islam.

Sulkhan Bordzikashvili, a journalist and a resident of Pankisi, said that local residents have been under severe police control for many years. According to his story, they are examined for a long time at the borders and not let outside the country.

Numerous cases when Pankisi residents were not allowed to travel outside Georgia appeared after the introduction of the visa-free regime the European Union, Mr Bordzikashvili has noted.

Foreign tourists are also warned not to visit the Pankisi Gorge.