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Georgia's most watched TV station, Rustavi 2, has been condemned by the Georgian Young Lawyers Association (GYLA) for broadcasting "slander" about GYLA and misrepresenting a story about human rights abuses in Georgia through "biased [and] unchecked assumption" and because the station "relied on false information", reports the Human Rights Centre.

On 12 December Rustavi 2, which receives "state aid" and maintains a consistent pro-government line, claimed that GYLA's legal intervention on behalf of three Georgian citizens who were apparently unlawfully and unconstitutionally detained by the Georgian authorities had delayed the release of four teenagers seized by the authorities in Tskhinvali.

The three men that GYLA had made representations about were all ethnic Ossetians who had been arrested and jailed after the August War of 2009 but who, on release, had disappeared.

It later transpired that they were all being held without charge by the Georgian authorities who then used them as bargaining chips in negotiations over the seized teenagers.

As GYLA point out the arbitraray seizure of Georgian citizens and their incarceration without charge is an open breach of the Georgian constition and indeed Shota Utiashvili (pictured), one of the most senior officials in the Georgian interior ministry repeatedly claimed - and he must surely have known it was a lie - that no such prisoners were held in Georgia's jails.

GYLA's full statement, from the Human Rights Centre's website, is below:

Georgian Young Lawyers Association makes statement about the information spread by the news program of the Rustavi 2 “Kurieri P.S” on December 12. The TV-item was about the activities of the GYLA about the people missing and arbitrarily detained after the war in August, 2008. Since the author and program producer of the TV-item seriously damaged several details and journalists reported biased, unchecked assumption relied on false information, the GYLA thinks it is necessary to make the following statement.

After the war of August, 2009 GYLA sent 55 suits of more than 350 victims to the European Court of Human Rights. While working on case-selection, organization paid particular attention to the gravity of human rights violation and their proofs; however, the organization did not pay attention to ethnicity of suitors.

GYLA does not differentiate people on ethnic or other grounds – protection of human rights without any discrimination is fundamental principle of our activities.

We have followed those principles when we sent two appeals to the Human Rights Court in Strasbourg on September 17, 2009: one of them was against Russia and second was against Georgia. The first suit was about four ethnic Georgian people arbitrarily detained in Tskhinvali and requested their prompt release. The second suit was about three ethnic Ossetian people, citizens of Georgia, who disappeared under governance of Georgian authority.

“Kurieri P.S.” reported that those three Ossetian people were “criminals” released with the support of GYLA who were detained during the armed conflict in August, 2008; according to the reported information Georgian government kept them to exchange them into Georgian hostages later.

In fact, Lavrenti Kaziev and Ibragim Laliev were not detained during the conflict but in October of 2008 two months after the war for illegal possession of weapon. Vladimer Eloev was detained in April of 2009, 8 months after the armed conflict for illegal crossing of Georgian border, illegal possession of weapon and for having kept a policeman as a hostage. The prosecutor’s office signed plea bargain with the three people and Georgian court released them from court room on August 4, 2009.

However, after August 4, Kaziev, Laliev and Eloev disappeared. Their family members, who live in Georgia and are citizens of Georgia, applied to GYLA for help. Since the GYLA could not find out their location from the MIA or Ministry of Justice, the organization sent suit to the European Court of Human Rights one and half month later.

At the end of September of 2009 European Court of Human Rights asked the Georgian side to provide them the information about the detainees and in reply the Ministry of Justice admitted that missing Kaziev, Laliev and Eloev were detained by Georgian police. Georgian side did not explain the motive of their detention to the court.

GYLA states that the activities of the government of Georgia against our citizens – Kaziev, Laliev and Eloev were illegal and unfair for following reasons.

• In accordance to the Constitution and Law of Georgia, “Deprivation of liberty or other restriction of personal liberty without a court decision shall be impermissible.” There is no exception for this regulation;

• Participation in kidnapping of people and disappearance will not benefit into the peaceful resolution of conflict and trust-building among the peoples living on both sides of administrative border.

GYLA assesses the statement of Rustavi 2 - the suit sent by the organization to the Strasbourg Court hindered the release of Georgian adults from Tskhinvali detention setting - as slander. Author of the TV-item and producer spread the unchecked information without factual evidences.

What measures did the government of Georgia take to release four Georgian adults from detention? What was the reason for the detention of Ossetian citizens and if the government was really going to exchange detainees (that is illegal action), why did it fail – the government of Georgia has not made official statement about this fact. Consequently, the Georgian society is still waiting for their reply.

Despite the false information and slander spread by the Rustavi 2, the GYLA hopes the information spread by the Rustavi 2 on December 12 is result of poor professionalism of the journalist and the producer of the concrete program and not purposeful disinformation.