Georgian Dream adopted the Russian law, which restricts free and critical opinions in Georgia. The law blocks the path of the people of Georgia to the European Union.

According to the Law of Georgia on the State Security Service of Georgia, the State Security Service of Georgia shall ensure state security within its competence. However, according to the observation of the Democracy Research Institute, for years, the State Security Service has been investigating criminal cases, which by their nature do not fit into its work direction and have no relation to ensuring the country's security, which leads to the irrational spending of the Service's budgetary and human resources. The mentioned is a special challenge in the background when there is no effective parliamentary control over the activities of the State Security Service.

Investigative jurisdiction over criminal cases is determined by Order No. 3 of the Prosecutor General of Georgia of August 23, 2019. The mentioned order ensures the distribution of criminal cases among the relevant investigative services depending on the directions of their activities.

The state shall have a public interest in detecting and investigating any crime, however, due to the nature of the activities of the state security services, these agencies should be strictly limited to the protection of national security interests and should not engage in activities that are not related to security.[1]

Despite this, the Prosecutor General’s order gives the State Security Service the mandate to investigate criminal cases that, in their essence, do not belong to the matter of state security and do not fall under the direction of the Service's activities. For example, the State Security Service has the authority to investigate all crimes committed by public officials (including by negligence).[2] In addition, it is clear from the annual activity reports of the Service that the Anti-Corruption Agency of the State Security Service investigates the most crimes.[3] In addition, the main resources of the Service are spent not on the detection of large corrupt deals, but on the investigation of petty corruption crimes.[4]

In addition to granting broad powers to the State Security Service by Prosecutor General’s order, part 6 of Article 33 of the Criminal Procedure Code of Georgia grants the Prosecutor General of Georgia or a person authorized by him the right to transfer a case from one investigative body to another investigative body for investigation.

As can be seen from the analysis of public information, the Prosecutor General uses this exclusive authority often. The Democracy Research Institute requested from the State Security Service information: about the articles of the Criminal Code under which the Service started investigations from January 1, 2020 to March 1, 2024.[5] According to the response,[6] the State Security Service had launched investigations on the basis of the articles of the Criminal Code, which, according to the order of the Prosecutor General of Georgia on the determination of the investigative and territorial investigative jurisdiction over criminal cases, did not belong to its jurisdiction.

For example, during the mentioned period, the State Security Service launched investigations into crimes such as: preparation of premediated murder (Articles 18 and 108 of the Criminal Code); pushing to suicide (Article 115 of the Criminal Code); Infliction of less serious or serious damage to health by negligence (Article 124 of the Criminal Code); Fraud (Article 180 of the Criminal Code). According to the order of the Prosecutor General of Georgia, all the mentioned crimes belong to the investigative jurisdiction of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and in certain cases, they may be investigated by the Special Investigative Service. However, these crimes, which, at first glance, have nothing to do with the activities of the State Security Service, were investigated by the State Security Service.

In addition, according to the same response, during the mentioned period, a case of illegally getting a credit (Article 208 of the Civil Code) was sent to the State Security Service for investigation. In its essence, the case does not fall under any direction of the activity of the State Security Service.

The above once again confirms the inevitable necessity of structural and democratic reforms in the State Security Service.