Category Archives: Georgia

Former aide to de facto leader of Georgia being held as ‘personal prisoner’, mother claims

Posted on by

Marina Ramazashvili says son, Giorgi Bachiashvili, was the victim of a ‘vendetta’ by billionaire politician

The mother of a jailed former aide to Bidzina Ivanishvili has accused the de facto leader of Georgia of treating her son as his “personal prisoner” as she appealed to the west for help.

Marina Ramazashvili, a renowned ophthalmologist in Georgia, said Giorgi Bachiashvili, who has allegedly been beaten in his prison cell, was the victim of a “vendetta” waged by the billionaire politician.

Continue reading...

Politicians in at least 51 countries used anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric during elections, NGO finds

Posted on by

Rights group also finds rise in openly gay, bisexual and transgender people running for office in 36 countries

Politicians in at least 51 countries used homophobic or transphobic rhetoric during elections last year, from depicting LGBTQ+ identity as a foreign threat to condemning “gender ideology”, according to a new study of 60 countries and the EU.

However, there were also gains for LGBTQ+ representation in some countries. Openly gay, bisexual and transgender people ran for office in at least 36 countries, including for the first time in Botswana, Namibia and Romania – albeit unsuccessfully – according to the report by Outright International. The number of LGBTQ+ elected officials doubled to at least 233 in Brazil.

Continue reading...

300 South Koreans detained at Hyundai plant in US to be released, says Seoul

Posted on by

Footage of raid by US immigration officials showed detained workers in handcuffs and with chains around their ankles

South Korea announced on Sunday that the roughly 300 of its nationals detained during an immigration raid in Georgia would be released and flown home, as the sudden detention of workers appeared to strain the longstanding diplomatic and economic relationship between the two nations.

Nearly 500 workers, among them at least 300 South Koreans and at least 23 Mexicans, were arrested at the Hyundai-LG battery plant in the city of Ellabell on Thursday.

Continue reading...

At least 475 workers detained in major Ice raid at US Hyundai factory

Posted on by

South Korea concerned after hundreds were arrested at Georgia work site making batteries for Hyundai and Kia cars

Hundreds of workers at a factory being built in Georgia to make car batteries for Hyundai and Kia electric vehicles were detained in a huge raid by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) on Thursday that stopped construction.

The facility is part of what would be the biggest industrial investment in the state’s history and had been hailed as a huge boost for the economy by Georgia’s Republican governor, Brian Kemp.

Continue reading...

Georgian MP who accused west of ‘blackmail’ appointed security chief as report warns of autocratic takeover

Posted on by

Mamuka Mdinaradze appointed as study says his Georgian Dream party has consolidated control

A Georgian Dream MP who criticised the west over a “policy of blackmail and threats” has been appointed to lead the country’s security services as an authoritative report warned of an autocratic takeover.

Mamuka Mdinaradze, who was the parliamentary majority leader for the ruling party, was confirmed on Wednesday as head of the country’s powerful state security service.

Continue reading...

Fulton county election board faces $10,000 a day fine for not appointing Republicans

Posted on by

Democrats voted against appointing two candidates known for election denialism and voter registration challenges

The Fulton county commission in Georgia will be fined $10,000 a day for violating a court order to appoint two Republicans associated with Trump-aligned groups pushing voter fraud conspiracies to the county’s election board.

The county charter states that commissioners “shall” appoint two Republicans and two Democrats nominated by their respective county party chairperson, for two-year terms. When commissioners rejected the nomination by Fulton county’s Republican party chair, the superior court judge David Emerson issued an order requiring the board to appoint them.

Continue reading...

Atlanta CDC gunman believed Covid vaccine made him suicidal, official says

Posted on by

Shooter, a 30-year-old man who died during violence, fired dozens of rounds into buildings and killed police officer

A Georgia man who opened fire on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta on Friday, shooting dozens of rounds into four buildings and killing a police officer, had blamed a Covid-19 vaccine for making him depressed and suicidal, a law enforcement official told the Associated Press on Saturday.

The 30-year-old gunman, identified by the Georgia bureau of investigation as Patrick Joseph White, tried to get into the CDC’s headquarters but was stopped by guards before driving to a CVS across the street and opening fire, the official said. White died during Friday’s violence.

The suspect’s father contacted police and said his son was upset about the death of his dog, and had also become fixated on the Covid-19 vaccine, an official said.

Continue reading...

Shooter in custody after five soldiers shot on Georgia military base, army says

Posted on by

Parts of base had been on lockdown earlier after shooter was reported, as base says all five were moved to hospital

Five soldiers were shot and wounded on Wednesday on the Fort Stewart military base in south-east Georgia before the shooter was taken into custody.

Parts of the base had been locked down earlier on Wednesday after a shooter was reported on the sprawling army post, a spokesperson said.

Continue reading...

Eastern US swelters from heatwave as high temperatures affect half of country

Posted on by

Heat and humidity are stretching east from the Mississippi River valley, and some areas could see heat indices of 120F

The eastern half of the US is facing a significant heatwave, with more than 185 million people under warnings due to intense and widespread heat conditions on Monday.

The south-east is likely to endure the most dangerous temperatures as the extreme heat spread across the region on Monday, spanning from the Carolinas through Florida. In these areas, heat index values (how hot it feels once humidity is accounted for) are forecast to range between 105 and 113F (40.5 to 45C).

Continue reading...

Family sues after funeral home sends son’s brain in unmarked leaking box

Posted on by

Remains of Timothy Garlington shipped from Georgia funeral home to another in Pennsylvania

Two funeral homes allegedly gave grieving parents their deceased son’s brain in a box, which began to smell, leaked into their car and got on the father’s hands when he moved it, according to an updated lawsuit filed this week.

The father, Lawrence Butler, said the discovery was overwhelming at a news conference on Thursday, leaving a horrific memory that mars the other memories of a “good young man”, their son, Timothy Garlington.

Continue reading...

British teenager Bella Culley to be held in Georgia until September drugs trial

Posted on by

Tbilisi judge rejects lawyer’s offer of plea agreement for release of pregnant Teesside teenager, now 19, at hearing

The British teenager Bella Culley is to be held in a Georgian prison for at least five more weeks as she awaits trial on drug-smuggling charges, a court in Tbilisi has ordered.

Culley, the great-granddaughter of a former Labour MP, was arrested on arrival at the city’s airport in May. Georgian prosecutors said she was carrying a large amount of illegal drugs in luggage she brought with her from Thailand.

Continue reading...

Family of man killed after his tent was crushed by a bulldozer sues Atlanta

Posted on by

Cornelius Taylor was killed during a sweep of a homeless encampment in city’s preparation for MLK weekend

The family of a man who was killed after city workers crushed his tent with a bulldozer during a sweep of a homeless encampment in Atlanta, Georgia, filed a lawsuit against the city on Friday over his death, calling it “tragic and preventable”.

The lawsuit filed by Cornelius Taylor’s sister and son alleges that city employees failed to look to see if there was anyone inside the tents in the encampment before using a bulldozer to clear it in the 16 January sweep. Taylor, 46, was inside one of the tents and was crushed by the truck when his tent was flattened, the lawsuit says.

Continue reading...

Spanish-language journalist still in Ice custody despite being granted bond

Posted on by

Mario Guevara, arrested in Georgia while covering a protest, still detained after Ice refused his family’s bond payment

A week after an immigration judge granted him bond, a Spanish-language journalist who was arrested while covering a protest last month remains in federal custody.

Police just outside Atlanta arrested Mario Guevara while he was covering a protest on 14 June, and he was turned over to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice) several days later. He was being held at an immigration detention center in Folkston – in south-east Georgia, near the Florida border – when an immigration judge last week granted him bond.

Continue reading...

Georgian man extradited to US to face charges over poison-candy terror plot

Posted on by

Officials say Michail Chkhikvishvili is the leader of a neo-Nazi group that promotes violence against minorities

The leader of an eastern European neo-Nazi group has been extradited to the United States from Moldova following his arrest last summer for allegedly instructing an undercover federal agent to dress as Santa Claus and hand out poisoned candy to Jewish children and racial minorities, prosecutors said.

Michail Chkhikvishvili, a 21-year-old from the republic of Georgia, was arraigned on Friday before a federal judge in Brooklyn on multiple felonies, including soliciting hate crimes and acts of mass violence.

Continue reading...

‘From all sides’: universities in red states face attacks from DC and at home

Posted on by

As universities begin to push back on Trump’s policies, those in Republican-led states face multiple threats

Days after the University of Michigan president, Santa Ono, announced that he was leaving his post to lead the University of Florida, his name was quietly removed on Wednesday from a letter signed by more than 600 university presidents denouncing the Trump administration’s “unprecedented government overreach and political interference” with academic institutions.

As Ono is set to become the highest-paid public university president in the country, in a state that has often been at the forefront of the rightwing battle against higher education, the reversal, first reported on by Talking Points Memo, underscored the challenges of standing up against the government’s sweeping attacks on education in solidly red states.

Continue reading...

Toby Jones’s next campaign? Misinformation, and a huge immersive theatre show

Posted on by

Meera Syal also to star in London production reflecting producer’s experience of censorship in Georgia

Hidden from view inside a south London warehouse, a new underground movement will be fighting the international blight of misinformation this summer.

The huge immersive event – half theatrical show, half social campaign – is to involve some of Britain’s leading acting talent, including Toby Jones and Meera Syal, and has been put together by a theatre company led by a woman who learned about misinformation the hard way, at the Georgian television station Imedi.

Continue reading...

More US states report measles cases amid vaccine misinformation

Posted on by

Ohio, Maryland and Alabama among states to report new cases, with 378 confirmed in first few months of 2025

More US states are reporting measles cases as the Texas outbreak expands, surpassing last year’s total, amid vaccine misinformation and hesitancy.

The Texas outbreak could take a year to get under control, one health official said – during which time it may spread to more states. Yet the parents of the six-year-old girl who died of measles in Texas have spoken against measles vaccination as misinformation continues to proliferate, including from figures such as the US health secretary, Robert F Kennedy Jr.

Continue reading...

Pentagon official condemned over tweet about Jewish victim lynched by Georgia mob

Posted on by

Kingsley Wilson cast doubt on circumstances of death of Leo Frank, in echo of white supremacist talking point

The Anti-Defamation League (ADL) has condemned a past social media post by the Pentagon spokesperson Kingsley Wilson that disputed the innocence of Leo Frank, a Jewish businessman whom most historians agree was wrongfully convicted of killing a 13-year-old factory worker and lynched in 1915 during a wave of antisemitism in the US.

“Leo Frank raped & murdered a 13-year-old girl. He also tried to frame a Black man for his crime,” Wilson wrote on X in response to an August 2024 tweet by the ADL marking the 109th anniversary of Frank’s lynching. “The ADL turned off the comments because they want to gaslight you.”

Continue reading...

Two Georgia opposition leaders arrested at anti-government protest

Posted on by

Nika Melia and Gigi Ugulava detained as thousands try to block highway into Tbilisi amid unrest against ruling party

Georgian police arrested two opposition leaders during a street protest against the ruling party on Sunday, a move quickly denounced by the EU, which condemned Tbilisi’s “brutal crackdown”.

The Black Sea nation has been rocked by daily mass protests since the Georgian Dream party claimed victory in October parliamentary elections rejected by the opposition as falsified.

Continue reading...

Southwest Airlines pilot charged with DUI while preparing for takeoff

Posted on by

Officers said pilot had bloodshot eyes and smelled of alcohol before planned flight from Savannah to Chicago

Police at a Georgia airport arrested an airline pilot on a DUI charge as he was making pre-flight checks aboard a Southwest Airlines flight with bloodshot eyes and reeking of what smelled like alcohol, according to a police report.

Passengers had boarded the Southwest Airlines flight from Savannah to Chicago and were awaiting takeoff on Wednesday morning when police boarded the plane and took the pilot away in handcuffs.

Continue reading...