The ongoing process of nomination of judges is not in the spirit of the April 19 compromise agreement reached among the Georgian political parties, said Kelly Degnan, US Ambassador to Georgia.

According to the US Ambassador, the judiciary is a separate breach. The government has to use all opportunities to strengthen and improve it.

“We were extremely disappointed to see the High Council of Justice push through nominations, certainly, that is not in the spirit of the April 19th agreement, and while the judiciary is a separate branch of government it is hard to understand why they would not want to take this opportunity to improve and strengthen Georgia’s judiciary. We have worked together on judicial reform with Georgia for 25 years. It’s a process and there is more work to be done. This was a perfect opportunity to allow for an inclusive, transparent process.

Now, it is up to the parliament, which must approve the nominations that the High Council has put forward, and again, I sincerely hope—and we are all watching to see whether parliament, the ruling party and the opposition parties are truly committed to fulfilling the obligations they negotiated and agreed to in the April 19th agreement—that includes substantive judicial reform and that includes pausing the nomination process, the appointment process of these judges, and if these go through again, I think, it will raise questions about the commitment to fulfilling the April 19th Agreement.

Claims that these appointments must go through, or the judicial system will collapse are unfounded. Recent assessments by international experts determined that there are enough judges in place to handle the workload. Certainly, there are enough judges in place to allow for a pause in these appointment processes that would allow for an inclusive, transparent, substantive debate on what kinds of judicial reforms are needed.

That is what the parties committed to, including the ruling party, in the April 19th Agreement, both in the letter and the spirit during the negotiations. These negotiations were six months of discussions by all of the parties, and in the end, the parties agreed to provisions that are in the April 19th Agreement, including an assessment of the recent waves of judicial reform in order to establish the kinds of reforms that are now needed to go forward,” Kelly Degnan said.

The US Ambassador urged the government to pause the appointment process until an inclusive debate on the judiciary reform could take place.

“By pushing forward these appointments before that discussion has happened, before a reform package has been developed by the full parliament with input from civil society and professional organizations, it is undermining both the letter and the spirit of the April 19th Agreement, and perhaps more importantly, it is missing an opportunity to improve Georgia’s judicial system in important ways. So, I sincerely hope that parliament will take its responsibilities next week very seriously, do what it committed to do in the April 19th Agreement, which is to pause the appointments process until a full and inclusive debate on judicial reform can take place,” Kelly Degnan claimed.