At the meeting with the committee Chairs, we raised our concerns about the draft legislation pertaining to the State Inspector service, in particular provisions that would result in the dismissal of the entire staff of the agency. Such a statement made today the US Ambassador to Georgia after meeting with the ruling team in the Parliament.

“We had the opportunity to discuss legislation that would change the disciplinary process in the judiciary for judges, and some of the other amendments to the law in common courts.

We raised our concerns that these were being rushed through without an inclusive, consultative process, without talking to stakeholders when these are both very important and sensitive pieces of legislation that deserve broad consultation and time to deliberate.

In both cases, we urged the committee chairs to delay the process. I was reassured to hear that there is going to be a process beginning in January of consultations on judicial reform and our recommendation or suggestion would be to take any legislative amendments under consideration through an expedited fashion and make them part of a more comprehensive judicial reform assessment.

I hope the committee chairs will take our concerns seriously and will consider delaying both of these pieces of legislation until there can be more comprehensive, broad, inclusive consultation with other stakeholders”, - added Kelly Degnan.