Protecting and Empowering Refugees, Asylum Seekers, Humanitarian Status Holders, and Stateless Persons in Georgia
1 January, 2019
Project Title: Protecting and Empowering Refugees, Asylum Seekers, Humanitarian Status Holders, and Stateless Persons in Georgia
Project Implementation Period: January 2019 – December 2025
Funding by Year:
- 2019 – 314,007.80 GEL
- 2020 – 335,349.11 GEL
- 2021 – 402,235.55 GEL
- 2022 – 424,930.10 GEL
- 2023 – 379,460.48 GEL
- 2024 – 385,206.27 GEL
- 2025 – 407,477.00 GEL
Donor: Project is financially supported by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR)
Project Goal: To protect and empower refugees, asylum seekers, humanitarian status holders, and stateless persons in Georgia by providing legal assistance and supporting their access to essential services.
Objective I: Improve access to and quality of legal protection for refugees, asylum seekers, and humanitarian status holders
Planned activities under this objective include:
- Providing legal information, counselling, and assistance (in person and remotely, including through a 24/7 dedicated hotline) to newly arrived foreign nationals and stateless persons, particularly on the asylum system in Georgia, all stages of asylum procedures, and their rights and entitlements throughout the process, including placement and timelines in the Martkopi Reception Centre;
- Legal representation during all stages of asylum procedures and in courts for cases of strategic importance, including before the Constitutional Court of Georgia and the European Court of Human Rights;
- In selected cases, based on pre-agreed criteria, providing legal assistance in other types of cases—such as naturalisation, access to rights and services, or detention—with the aim of creating positive jurisprudence and precedent-setting decisions;
- Representation of asylum seekers during administrative interviews in certain cases to monitor the process;
- Active coordination and cooperation with the Legal Aid Service of Georgia on key developments and challenges in the asylum field;
- Preparing, contributing to, translating, and/or disseminating relevant information materials on legal protection in cooperation with UNHCR as needed;
- Communicating information about the organization’s work in the asylum field, Georgia’s asylum system, and positive case outcomes to the wider public through the organisation’s platforms;
- Providing asylum seekers with information on institutions and organizations offering social or other assistance, and informing relevant agencies about the rights of refugees, humanitarian status holders, asylum seekers, and stateless persons under national, regional, and international standards.
Objective II: Improve access to and quality of legal protection for stateless persons
Planned activities under this objective include:
- Providing legal information, counselling, and assistance to stateless persons and individuals at risk of statelessness, from the stage of applying to the competent administrative authority through the entire status determination process, while informing them of their rights and entitlements throughout;
- Legal representation in selected cases, based on predefined criteria, before administrative bodies and common courts;
- In exceptional cases, legal representation of beneficiaries before the European Court of Human Rights and the Constitutional Court of Georgia;
- Developing and disseminating informational materials—through the organization’s platforms—on statelessness, existing challenges, national regulations, and available services, including updates on cooperation with the European Network on Statelessness (ENS).
