On March 12th, 2012 Georgian gender equality and LGBT human rights organization Identoba addressed the authors of the 53rd paragraph of the Georgian criminal law – members of georgian parliament, Zviad Kukava and Kakha Anjaparidze, with a special statement, inviting them to include gender identity and sexual orientation in the list of the aggravating circumstances of discrimination, which already includes discrimination on racial, language, religious, national and ethnic grounds.

Today the Legal Issues Committee of Georgian Parliament held the second hearing of the bill, where Levan Kokaia, lawyer representing Identoba and parliamentary secretary for the Young Georgian Lawyer’s Association, Tatuli Todua, called for members of parliament to consider the abovementioned recommendation.

The Legal Issues Committee of Georgian Parliament has agreed to apply the recommendation to the bill and sexual orientation and gender identity were included in the list of the grounds for discrimination, which will be considered as the aggravating circumstances in the new criminal law.

Our organization remains hopeful that “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” will stay in the final version of the law, which will be approved by the Georgian Parliament after the third hearing scheduled next week.

http://identoba.org/5834