Chairman of the Constitutional Court, Giorgi Papuashvili, has claimed that some of the judges of the 9-member Court are being pressured and “blackmailed” to either rule in favor of the authorities or drag out verdicts in several high-profile cases that are now under consideration in the Court.

“I want to speak about new alarming cases. A targeted pressure has been ongoing on some judges in recent days, involving secret surveillance, deliberate pressure on commercial activities of their relatives, blackmailing that their relatives will be detained over various pretexts, and also making public information – mostly fabricated – related to judges’ private lives. All these instances of [pressure] are related to cases of high public interest, which are currently under consideration in the Constitutional Court; the [pressure] on judges aims at either taking decisions in favor of the authorities or maximally dragging out the decision making process,” Papuashvili said.

He declined to specify the cases in question. Among the high-profile cases now being considered by the Constitutional Court are several complaints filed by Tbilisi-based Rustavi 2 TV, stemming from ongoing dispute over the ownership of the opposition-minded private broadcaster. Papuashvili said that the Constitutional Court’s verdict on July 20 rejecting opposition UNM lawmakers’ complaint against electoral redistricting was not among the cases over which pressure was exerted on some of the judges.

“I will refrain today from speaking about the details as in some cases it involves information of personal nature. The main goal of the statement I am making today is to prevent alarming cases we are now facing and to allow the Court to continue its normal functioning, and to decide cases solely based on constitution, laws and judges’ inner conviction, instead of pressure and threats,”

“I am ready to speak about the details of these cases with country’s political leadership,” said Papuashvili, whose ten-year term in the Constitutional Court expires in September.