Tbilisi. On August 10 "Transparency International - Georgia" has released the analysis of television broadcasting of Georgia. It covers the media developments during the pre-election period. The Report Source:transparency.ge

Kakheti.The youth in village Velistsikhe of the Gurjaani Municipality have established the youth "Public Activity Club", which unites up to 20 active students of the public school from the same village. According to the members of the "Public Activity Club", they already implement various types of events. As the volunteers say, the youth club will be mainly focused on public activities, charity and environmental protection. According to one of the leaders of the group Zaur Mirianashvili, one area of their activities is environmental protection, and therefore the majority of events is focusing on this topic: "We organize various events, but their majority focuses on protecting and cleaning the nature. For instance, we have cleaned the yard of the Velistsikhe public school and the swimming pool in the village center. We cooperate actively with the Gurjaani Youth Center. Our activists often participate in the events and trainings organized by them and take an active part." Members of the "Public Activity Club" say also that it is planned to expand the group and involve the youth from various villages of the Municipality in the public activities.

Adjara. On August 9, the organization "Every Child" delivered the training in the Civic Engagement Center in tutorship upbringing, which was attended by the potential recipient parents. This training was of an informative character and aimed at informing the potential recipient parents about personal development of a child. The project is funded by UNICEF.

Kakheti. In partnership with the Polish non-governmental organization B4, the "Community Development Center" has started implementing in Kakheti the project "Business for a Start". Within the project framework, at the first stage 60 women were selected based on a competition. Currently the second stage of the project is underway, which foresees delivering trainings to the semi-finalist women. Training seminars were launched on August 6 and will complete tomorrow. The project aims to promote the start of small entrepreneurship and self-employment by the women. The third stage of the project involves the development of business projects, in which they will be assisted by the project consultants. 20 women with the best business projects will receive small grants for starting up their own business.

Tbilisi. On August 9 the "Caucasian House" hosted the presentation of the new civil society organization "Union of Human Rights Advocates". The new CSO was founded by the members of the Georgian Bar Association and it aims to raise the population's legal awareness and protect the human rights and freedoms safeguarded under the Constitution of Georgia. The organization plans to offer to the population free of charge legal consultations and protection of their rights in the administrative agencies.

Samtskhe-Javakheti. The tragedy that took place in Georgia four years ago was remembered on August 8 in the Akhaltsikhe Youth Center. The event - "About the tragic days of August 2008"- was held as part of the Civic Education and the Teachers' Training Program. 20 students from the public schools of Samtskhe-Javakheti involved in the program and their parents, representative of the Akhaltsikhe Municipality Gamgeoba and the local media have participated in the event. The event started with a minute of silence, by which the participants have paid their tribute to the soldiers and civilian population killed during the August War. Members of the Civic Club have presented their paintings, sketches and poems dedicated to this day. Demonstration/discussion of a mini video has followed. Importantly, this event will become a tradition, thus once again reminding the future generation of the August 8 tragedy.

Kakheti. The "Youth Club" functioning with the Gurjaani Public School #1 became a part of the August week and held the charity event. Volunteers of the Club have prepared hand-made necklaces, red poppies, and sold it for a symbolic price of 1 GEL. The event took off yesterday and will end today. The amount raised from the charity event will be presented to the families of SosoGhviniashvili and AleksiNatroshvili, residents of the Gurjaani Municipality who were killed in the August war. JemalKalabegashvili, organizer of the event: "We decided to pay our tribute and prepare hand-made red poppies and sell them after bringing to all organizations. Besides organizations, we organize street events as well in order to raise the maximum amount, and the raised amount will be presented to the families of those killed in the August war." In addition, today at 7 p.m. the "Youth Club" plans to hold an outdoor movie session.

Tbilisi. The office of the Foundation will be closed for staff retreat during August 8-15. source: osgf.ge

Shida Kartli. On August 7 the Civil Development Agency (CIDA) organized the information meeting in the Gori Democracy Development Center. Local CSOs and guests invited by CIDA have participated in the meeting: representatives of the Georgian Young Lawyers' Association, ISFED and Transparency International - Georgia. Two issues were discussed: Transparency International - Georgia has presented the results of the report concerning the spending of the central budget during the election year. In addition, the results were compared with the priorities and expenses of the non-election year budgets. Second issue covered the portal www.electionportal.ge set up by the Georgian Young Lawyers' Association, ISFED and Transparency International - Georgia. The portal reflects pre-election processes and will also operate on the polling day and afterwards. Any citizen can provide to the portal administration the violation observed by him/her or any other election-related information, photo materials, etc. Based on the received information the portal maintains the map of violations, which is constantly amended and updated. A discussion has followed the presentation of the portal.

Imereti. On August 7, the Georgian Young Lawyers' Association has presented the projects "Know Who to Elect and For What" and "My Voice in Parliament" in the office of the Civic Engagement Center. The duration of the project "Know Who to Elect and For What is 5 months and it aims at informing the third sectors and increasing their involvement. As part of this project it is planned to have field meetings with the population, as well as to deliver various trainings to mass media and the third sector. The second project "My Voice in Parliament" is funded by the "Public Policy, Advocacy and Civil Society Development Program" of the East-West Management Institute. The project aims to take into consideration the voters' interests and solve the problems of the Imereti Region's population through the bureaus of single-seat MP candidates.

Kakheti. The civil society organization "Media Center Kakheti" held the meeting in Gurjaani with the young volunteers and the local CSO representatives about setting up the NGO networks and managing the volunteer resources. 25 representatives of local youth groups have attended the meeting. The participants were briefed about the networking operations, purpose of a network, the role of networks in the implementation of civil programs, the types of functioning networks, etc. In respect of management of volunteer resources the emphasis was made on the methods of attracting the volunteers, qualification of volunteers, their right selection and the key principles according to which the volunteers should be selected and maintained. Maka Khaziauri, the coordinator of youth programs of the "Media Center Kakheti": "Training participants were actively involved in the discussion. The meeting turned out to be interesting for them. Topic on the management of volunteers was of interest, and particularly their right selection, maintenance, and equal distribution of work to them. As they have noted, with this knowledge their activities will simplify and they will definitely use these pieces of advice in the future in various projects."

On July 19, several districts of Southern and Eastern Georgia were considerably damaged by a strong storm, rain and hail. Over 20,000 families have suffered huge losses; their homes and harvest were destructed. Roads were demolished, and communications and the water system were put out of order. Residential houses and agricultural land plots were flooded, cattle was killed and the harvest was destructed. According to the locals, this was the worst natural disaster they had ever witnessed. The European Commission will allocate assistance in the amount of €118,590 for the most aggrieved and vulnerable groups. This assistance will be distributed through the Georgian Red Cross Society, which on its part operates under the funding of the Disaster Relief Emergency Fund (DREF) of the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies. For full text Source: eeas.europa.eu/delegations/georgia/index_ka.htm

Samtskhe-Javakheti. On July 6 the members of the youth group of the "Union of Democrat Meskhetians" have travelled to Bakuriani to participate in the summer camp organized by the United Nations Association of Georgia. The summer camp will last for a week. Youngsters from Akhaltsikhe and 12 other cities of Georgia will participate in the camp. The camp was organized within the framework of the project "Advancing National Integration in Georgia", which is funded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID) and is implemented by the United Nations Association of Georgia.

Tbilisi. In the light of the recent legislative amendments, EPF, together with other Georgian civil society organizations and experts, makes a statement regarding food safety and consumer rights protection situation in Georgia. Please see the attachment. Statement Source: www.epfound.ge

Imereti. On August 4, the civil society organization IZONE (Innovative Zone) held the meeting in the Kutaisi Civic Engagement Center concerning the "contemporary Georgian cinema". Art historian Teo Khatiashvili has presented the thesis on whether the contemporary Georgian cinema reflects the reality, Salome Jashi on documentary movie - deconstruction of manipulation, while cinema critic Tea Gabidzashvili spoke about the cultural and educational functions of cinema and the policy of municipal cinema. A discussion and demonstration of a movie followed after the meeting.

Kakheti. On August 3, the Telavi Civic Engagement Center has hosted the meeting organized by the civil society organization "Civil Society Research and Development Center", concerning the presentation of plan of the working group for Kakheti's regional development and drafting of the strategy for 2012-2017. The project is funded by the German Agency for International Cooperation. Apart from the working group, representatives of various civil society organizations, public servants, businessmen, experts and interested persons have attended the project discussion. According to the Coordinator of Kakheti's regional development project Liza Sopromadze, the project aims to govern Kakheti effectively and elaborate the development strategy: "the regional development council is set up with the Office of Kakheti's Governor, which works on drafting the Kakheti's development strategy. The working group personally collects information, processes and forms the strategy. Group members are the experts, representatives of civil society organizations, education institutions, etc. The process is transparent and we try to reach everyone that the group has already started working on the development of the 5-year strategy and the deadline for which is 16th of October. We met with the business and CSO representatives and plan to meet with various other organizations also". The consulting body Regional development Council was set up in the Kakheti Region by the State Trustee - Governor. While working on the strategy within the project framework, the administration of the State Trustee - Governor closely cooperates with the German Agency for International Cooperation (GTZ).

Mtskheta-Mtianeti. 2-day seminar/training will be held on 3-5 August 2012 in Kazbegi, "Rooms Kazbegi" Hotel for the employees of the Legal Entity of Public Law Healthcare Mediation Service of the Ministry of Labor, Health and Social Welfare of Georgia concerning the healthcare mediation as an alternative source of dispute resolution. The seminar/training is organized as part of the "Protection of Human Rights by Promoting the Development of Healthcare Mediation" project funded by the "Open Society Foundations", which is implemented by the coalition "Human Rights in Healthcare Protection". The advantages and prospects of alternative sources of dispute resolution in healthcare and the procedure for examining and reacting to the citizens' complaints will be discussed at the training. Moot processes of healthcare mediation and case studies will take place during the seminar. The training aims to promote the introduction of healthcare mediation, discuss case studies at the moot processes and to highlight the advantages of the mediation process. Source:osgf.ge

Tbilisi."Media Development Foundation" has released the media-monitoring results on the topic "Coverage of conflicts in the Georgian media". Observations, main target of which were the developments around the separatist regions of Georgia, were carried out over a month and covered the spring of 2012. This period of time was selected on purpose, as it coincided with the so-called presidential elections in the separatist South Ossetia and the de-facto parliamentary elections in Abkhazia. Both the TV and print media outlets were selected as the monitoring objects. In particular, the stories aired by five TV companies - 1st Channel of Public Broadcaster, Rustavi 2, Imedi, Kavkasia and Maestro - in the news editions were analyzed. Publications printed by the weekly editions - KvirisPalitra, Asaval-Dasavali and Kronika - were observed from the print media. Within the scope of monitoring the emphasis was made on the quantitative and content components. For full text Source:media.ge

Tbilisi. To reduce homophobia and raise tolerance and lenience towards differentness, the civil society organization "Identoba" (identity) launches another new project. The project aims to organize the gay-straight alliances and thus to include the members of society in the fight against homophobia. In the opinion of the project authors this will assist the public in defeating the homophobia. Source:identoba.ge For full text

Tbilisi. On August 1, the civil society organization "Internews Georgia" released the radio monitoring results. The monitoring covered the period from 12 June to 23 July 2012. The researchers observed the evening news editions of 12 radio stations: Radio 1, Imedi, Utsnobi, Palitra, ApkhazetisKhma, TskheliShokoladi, Hereti (Lagodekhi), Atinati (Zugdidi), DzveliKalaki (Kutaisi), Green Wave, Fortuna and Radio Liberty. The described pre-election media monitoring is carried out with the support of the EU and the UN Development Program. The monitoring took off on May 11 of this year and will continue until December. The monitoring report is published on a monthly basis. Source:media.ge Report

Tbilisi. On July 27, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Human Rights Center have organized the seminar on "submission of communications to the UN Human Rights mechanisms". Representatives of the Analytical Center for Interethnic Cooperation and Consultations have participated in the workshop. The meeting aimed to raise the practical skills of human rights activists and advocates in issues such as the cooperation with the international treaty bodies. For full text see this link Source:www.acicc.ge

Kakheti. The training in the coverage of HIV/AIDS issues for the journalists was held in July 2012 in Lopota. 11 journalists from various media outlets have attended the training. The meeting was held within the framework of the law, media and health project of the "Open Society - Georgia" Foundation. For details see the video Source: osgf.ge