Panuashvili: police was beating youngsters at festival alternative to "Eurovision"

Last Sunday, on May 17, at the musical festival in Tbilisi "Open Air - Alter/Vision", held in parallel with "Eurovision-2009", the police was beating young guys from among the festival audience, and several dozens suffered. This was reported to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent by Soso Panuashvili, representative of the Human Rights in Tbilisi.

"In the context of the opposition's protest actions, the police behaves OK, but two days ago I was at the festival organized Saakashvili - the 'Tbilisi Open Air', held at the hippodrome. And there I became an eyewitness of the fact, when 20 young men were brutally beaten by policemen without any special reason," said Panuashvili.

"Basically, they were kids of 15-16 who played a rugby ball, but the police for some reason attacked them. They were beaten so brutally, that it's difficult to describe. People tried to stop it, as 20 policemen were in fact beating one boy. I can't say anything about their subsequent detention," Soso Panuashvili said to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

According to his version, those who tried to interfere were also beaten. "About 50 persons were beaten there. This brutal act of policemen means that they were quite sure that none of them would be punished. People tried to film the incident, but policemen took away photo and video cameras and crushed them," he has added.

The information about this incident was not made public by media, although it all happened on May 17 at about 9 o'clock in the evening at the hippodrome in Tbilisi, where the festival took place.

The "Caucasian Knot" correspondent could not gat any comments on the incident at Georgia's MIA.