The Georgian Young Lawyers Association (GYLA) reported that, in total, demonstrators have been charged 2 million GEL in fines. The organization has condemned this practice as severely violating the right to peaceful protests.
The NGO pointed out that fines have been issued for road blockages during spontaneous protests, an act that the government has heavily penalized recently.
The ruling party Georgian Dream recently introduced legislative changes to Article 174¹ of the Code of Administrative Offenses, which have drastically increased penalties, raising fines from 500 GEL to 5,000 GEL.
“Law enforcement officers rely on facial recognition technologies to identify protesters, while court rulings are solely based on photographic evidence more often than not, ignoring broader contexts, which disregards the bigger picture and, by nature, carries a lot of bias. From November 2024 to March 18, 2025, authorities have imposed fines totaling 2 million GEL under this provision,” the GYLA writes.
GYLA warned the public that the government’s approach poses an alarming escalation in repression, using financial means as an instrument to diminish freedom to peacefully protest.
