Report: Georgia violated journalist Mzia Amaglobeli’s right to a fair trial

New York, January 16, 2026—A report released Friday by TrialWatch found that Georgian authorities violated the fair trial rights of jailed journalist and Sakharov Prize laureate Mzia Amaglobeli, citing a series of violations that indicate that Georgian authorities sought to make an example of a leading journalist amid a wider press freedom and rights crackdown in Georgia. 

The Committee to Protect Journalists condemns the troubling violations highlighted in the fairness report and reiterates its call for authorities to release her. This week marked one year since Amaglobeli’s arrest and the halfway point in her two-year sentence.

“The findings of a report evaluating trial fairness for Georgian journalist Mzia Amaglobeli confirm that her prosecution has never been about due process but instead about striking fear into Georgia’s independent media,” said Gulnoza Said, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator. “Georgian authorities must now act on these findings by releasing Amaglobeli without delay. The country’s international partners must hold them to account until they do so.”

TrialWatch, a flagship initiative of the Clooney Foundation for Justice, monitors the trials of journalists worldwide, grading their fairness and ranking judicial systems on a global justice index. 

Amaglobeli’s prosecution contained “numerous violations of international human rights standards, which seriously undermined the fairness of her detention and trial and her conviction,” TrialWatch’s expert, Sir Nicolas Bratza, concluded, assigning the trial a D grade on the organization’s A-F scale.

The report highlighted multiple serious procedural flaws, including the court’s refusal to admit important defense evidence and witnesses, Amaglobeli’s confinement in a glass box — which limited her communication with her legal team and impaired her ability to participate in her defense — and the judge’s last-minute reclassification of charges, leaving Amaglobeli with “no meaningful opportunity” to defend herself. The judgement “failed to provide adequate reasons for the conviction and custodial sentence,” the report said, and failings of the first-instance trial were not remedied on appeal.

The authors noted how “prejudicial public statements” by senior officials, including Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze, “had already breached Amaglobeli’s right to the presumption of innocence.” The trial’s failings evidence “an intention to make an example of one of the most respected independent journalists in Georgia, in order to intimidate other dissenting voices,” TrialWatch concluded.

Amaglobeli was arrested on the night of January 11-12, 2025, after slapping a police chief in an altercation during a protest, and sentenced in August to two years in prison. Authorities’ decision to prosecute her on the major criminal charge of attacking a police officer and her jailing have been widely denounced as politically motivated.

In December, the European Parliament awarded her its Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought.

Amaglobeli’s eyesight has deteriorated drastically in detention, with one eye at 10 percent vision and the other capable only of light perception.