The Public Defender of Georgia has reviewed the cases of five trans* persons, who applied to the PDO in 2018 and whose interests were represented by the Women’s Initiatives Supporting Group (WISG). The applicants maintained that the unsubstantiated rejection of the Referral Commission to finance their diagnostic procedures constituted discrimination on grounds of gender identity.

We continue our work having mobilized our efforts to the maximum possible extent and do not intend to give up our position in order to conform to an agenda forged by various politically inclined groups. We thus consider it essential to publicly challenge these counterproductive measures and assess current developments.

Structural and systemic homo/bi/transphobia, which reproduces these attitudes on a societal level, has for many years been manifested by the state in a lack of political will to alter the heavy legacy of negative attitudes towards queer people and develop a progressive social policy oriented towards the elimination of SOGI-based discrimination and related economic, employment, and healthcare inequalities.