Batumelebi Newspaper Sues Ministry of Internal Affairs

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The Batumelebi newspaper sues the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Georgia- the Netgazeti reports.

The material reads that the Batumelebi requested from the Ministry the public information regarding the incident between representative of GYLA and Head of Adjara Police. Notably, what procedural action did law-enforcement officers carry out in Batumi 28 March in order to get the record made by a video eye, after the incident with the participation of  GYLA employee and the Head of Adjara Police Main Division had taken place on Griboedov Street.

The Batumelebi as well wanted to know whether the patrol police had indeed fined Valerian Telia due to his driving a car without driving license during the incident of March 28. Several days after the incident, journalists had found out that the Head of Adjara Police didn’t have a driving license that day. And only after that information had been publicized, did the Ministry of Internal Affairs state that Telia had been fined for that reason. In addition, the Batumelebi wanted to know the amount of the fine “- the information reads, and stresses that there were some questions which the Press Service of the Ministry had considered confidential and, therefore, refused to answer. Those questions were: Who is the Head of Criminal Police of Adjara? Who is the Head of State Security Agency in Adjara?

The Batumelebi believe that the bureau responsible for giving the public information from the Ministry of Internal Affairs did more than the simple violation of the terms defined by the law, i.e. sent the information to the Batumelebi within 10 days, as it left the letter without any reply at all.

“The Press Service of the Ministry stated that they couldn’t help us in this particular situation, as the  Bureau for Public Information is responsible for giving out such information. Then the Press Center told us they either couldn’t give us the telephone number of that bureau. The Office of the Ministry of Internal Affairs did, however, give us the number- 2 41 84 22, which they had claimed to be the number of the Bureau for Public Information, but nobody answered our calls for several weeks on the receiving end”- said in the material.

The interests of the Batumeteli will be advocated at Court by Georgian Young Lawyers Association.