Last year, press freedom in Georgia continued to rapidly decline as the ruling Georgian Dream party intensified its crackdown on dissent. Journalists were arbitrarily detained, brutally assaulted and intimidated, amidst wider democratic erosion.

IPI World Press Freedom Hero and founder of prominent independent media outlets Batumelebi and Netgazeti, Mzia Amaglobeli, has now been unjustly held behind bars on politically- motivated charges for over a year.

The ruling Georgian Dream (GD) party has also intensified legal harassment of media and civil society by adopting draconian laws targeting independent media, including a recent bill that, if adopted, will significantly expand state control over foreign funding and criminalize a wide range of cooperation with foreign entities.

Since the government’s announcement in November 2024 that it would halt Georgia’s EU-integration process, protestors have taken to the streets of the capital Tbilisi daily to challenge the democratic decline which followed.

One of the repeated targets of these protests has been Georgian Public Broadcaster (GPB) – which under the influence of the ruling party has slowly been distorted into a propaganda arm of the government and now represents a politically-captured institution.

While the broadcaster previously suffered sustained challenges to its editorial independence and sustainable funding under previous administrations, the shift after November 2024 has been dramatic – resulting in warnings and assessments from the EU.

Critical employees have been fired and public interest programmes have been removed from the airwaves. Censorship is heavy and editorial policy is biased towards the ruling party. News channels have been used as a propaganda tool to promote pro-government narratives and anti-Western rhetoric.

Amidst a further erosion of the broadcaster’s independence over the last year, IPI spoke with former GPB employee and producer of the now-cancelled political talk show Real Space, Tamar Mshvenieradze, to understand how we reached this point and what the situation inside the broadcaster is now.