Drafter: Nino Mtvarelishvili – Human Rights Events Manager
Seminar/Workshop:Title of Seminar/Workshop: “Labour Rights in Georgia”
Date: February 24, 2009
Location: Georgian Trade Unions Confederation
Length: 2 hours
Speakers:
• Irina Kurdadze – Consultant on International Cooperation & Projects’ Development, Representative of International Labour Organization (ILO)
• Raisa Liparteliani – Lawyer at Georgian Trade Unions Confederation

Topics elaborated: Nino Mtvarelishvili, Human Rights Events Manager –shortly presented CABIR and its related activities. She introduced the guest-speakers – Irina Kurdadze, and Raisa Liparteliani, and thanked the staff of the Georgian Trade Unions Confederation for the technical support extended to CABIR. The contact details of speakers were disseminated to the attendants.
Irina Kurdadze, made a short description of ILO and its activities in Georgia. She said that ILO plans to conduct public raising awareness seminars/workshops in Tbilisi and mostly in the regions to raise population’s awareness on unregulated migration and the possible risks associated with it. She mentioned some cases of illegal migration and the labour rights violations associated to it. Every citizen should have at least information about the possibility to work in foreign countries and the work conditions. Mostly lack of information causes many problems at the place of migration and it’s connected to human trafficking.
Raisa Liparteliani, spoke about labour rights in Georgia. She gave detailed information regarding labour relations and the problems mostly faced by ordinary citizens. She talked about the legal initiatives on the Labour Code of Georgia sent to the parliament. These initiatives relates to compensation sum, financial assistance for unemployment for a definite term, changes and amendments to the existing labour legislation. The speaker mentioned that the above amendments were requested by the European Union and also included various ILO recommendations. These amendments mainly referred to the general condition of employment.
The attendants expressed interest and their views on the discussed issues. The representatives of the Embassy of Latvia and various ministries of Georgia gave some practical examples and asked the speakers how to address certain of them. Additionally they were interested in the activities of Georgian Trade Unions Confederation and ILO and expressed their willingness to get more information and be more involved in their events in the future. The speakers spoke about foreign practice and case-law of Trade Unions Confederations of various countries as well.
Most relevant questions/answers: how ILO and the Georgian Trade Unions work, what events are planned by ILO, what amendments and/or changes to the Georgian Labour Code are initiated by the Georgian Trade Unions, what cases on violation of Labour rights exist within Georgian Trade Unions and how they were settled.
Total number of participants: 18
International Organizations: 7
NGO: 2
Academic Institutions: 4
Government Officials: 5