Tbilisi. ''We would like to express our concern over the apparent signs of political interest and influence illustrated by the developments on June 22nd, related to the Rustavi 2 TV lawsuit. In particular, we mean the deliberate acceleration of the processes by the Court, which resulted in decreasing of the period of time allocated to the sides to challenge the decision of the Court of Appeals in the Supreme Court of Georgia.

It is an unprecedented fact for the Court of Appeals to prepare the argumentations for the decision in such a short period of time and proactively deliver the copies of the decisions to the parties. No such action has been observed towards other cases. Based on this and the background of violations of the Court of the First Instance, suspicions of possible political meddling in the affairs of the court seem to be confirmed. In the period of the pre-electoral campaign, this is an issue of grave concern. Events which may affect the editorial policy of an opposition-leaning TV channel in the run-up to the elections can damage the quality of democracy and pluralistic media environment in the country,'' is noted in the statement.

Source: www.transparency.ge