{"id":1888,"date":"2018-02-21T22:46:53","date_gmt":"2018-02-21T22:46:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rcstaging.co.uk\/ehrac\/?p=1888"},"modified":"2021-04-08T21:56:31","modified_gmt":"2021-04-08T20:56:31","slug":"misuse-power-criminal-proceedings-what-next","status":"publish","type":[30],"link":"http:\/\/ehrac.org.uk\/en_gb\/misuse-power-criminal-proceedings-what-next\/","title":{"rendered":"What should happen after the European Court finds a \u2018misuse of power\u2019 in criminal proceedings against a leading opposition politician?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\t\t
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Ivane Merabishvili appears during a preliminary hearing of his case. (Reuters)<\/p><\/div>\n

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Under cover of darkness one night in December 2013, Ivane Merabishvili was hauled from his prison cell and taken to meet two of the highest ranking officials in Georgian law enforcement. The Chief Prosecutor of Georgia and the Head of the Georgian Prison Service attempted to blackmail the former Georgian Prime Minister into providing information on two other opposition politicians (belonging to Mr Merabishvili\u2019s party, one of whom had recently died). Last November (2017), the\u00a0Grand Chamber of the European Court of Human Rights found that Mr Merabishvili\u2019s detention was politically motivated<\/a>, in particular because of this incident. So what should happen now, three months after the Court\u2019s judgment?<\/p>\n

EHRAC and Georgian lawyer Oto Kakhidze represented Mr Merabishvili before the European Court. In January 2018, EHRAC wrote\u00a0to the Council of Europe\u2019s Committee of Ministers<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 the body charged with monitoring states\u2019 compliance with European Court judgments \u2013 setting out the next steps that we argue should be taken in Mr Merabishvili\u2019s case. We requested the Committee to call on the Georgian authorities to:<\/p>\n