Tbilisi City Court judge Nino Enukidze fined Georgian blogger Tornike Razmadze GEL 3,000 (USD 1,160) after the Interior Ministry launched proceedings against him under administrative charges of petty hooliganism over a Facebook comment where he used swear words.
The comment, which was posted under Razmadze’s August reel which compared narratives by Kremlin propagandist Margarita Simonyan and Georgian Dream Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze, does not explicitly identify a target, but Razmadze said it was directed at Simonyan.
Specifically, the comment reads “f**k their moms na koleniakh,” an apparent reference to Simonyan’s remarks featured in the reel where she says Georgian rulers will be begging “на коленях” — “on their knees” in Russian — for “Mother Russia” to take the country back.
In September, following a backlash over the proceedings, the Interior Ministry made a statement vaguely implying Razmadze was targeted for insulting Kobakhidze, not Simonyan. However, citing the court files, Razmadze and his supporters argued that the official allegations against him only cover “petty hooliganism” and do not include “insulting a public official” under Article 173(16) of the Administrative Offences Code, another clause also commonly invoked by the Ministry in similar cases.
The penalties are part of the Georgian Dream government’s crackdown on public statements and social media posts that authorities and courts deem offensive. The crackdown has intensified since the Interior Ministry established its Division for Combating Hate Speech in June to monitor “hate speech” in public spaces, including on social media, and file complaints with courts, often without a request from the individual deemed to have been “insulted.”
