Georgia preparing bill on Azerbaijani surnames

A working meeting took place in Georgian parliament to discuss the bill to give a legal ground to the Azerbaijani citizens of Georgia to change their surname endings, Report‘s local bureau informs, citing the press service of the legislature.

The meeting was attended by the chairman of the Parliamentary Committee on Human Rights and Civil Integration Mikheil Sarjveladze, his deputy Savalan Mirzayev, parliament member Zaur Dargalli, Deputy Minister of Justice Tornike Cheishvili, and representatives of the Public Service Development Agency.

It was noted that the committee is working on amending the legal framework to allow Georgian citizens (including Yazidis, Azerbaijanis) to restore their surnames following historical and cultural traditions.

The meeting participants stressed the importance of this issue for representatives of various ethnicities and discussed ways of resolving these matters.

The sides emphasized the need to agree on definite provisions at the final stage of the work on respective bills. Once developed, the document will be presented to parliament for consideration.

After that, the participants agreed to continue cooperation for a more detailed discussion of the bill.

Notably, Azerbaijanis living in Georgia applied for permission to take the endings ‘ov’ and ‘yev.’ The initiative group demanding amendments to the Law ‘On citizenship acts’ has been holding a campaign to collect 25,000 signatures since August 2.