2.8.2. Foreign nationals and persons without citizenship As of December 1, 2020, 584 foreign nationals and stateless prisoners were in penitentiary establishments,219 which accounted for 6.3% of the total number of prisoners.220 Unfortunately, the monitoring results show that no positive measures have been taken to ensure that they serve sentences in a dignified, equal conditions.221 The stay of foreign prisoners in penitentiary establishments is extremely difficult and differs significantly from the conditions of imprisonment of Georgian citizens. Upon admission to a penitentiary facility, foreign prisoners find themselves in a particularly vulnerable position. Placing a person in a foreign penitentiary institution in itself increases the fear for his/her physical safety, especially since the influences of informal ruling and the tense environment are easily noticeable in penitentiary establishments. Those who are in a precarious situation due to the language barrier do not have information about their rights and responsibilities and do not know who to turn to if they need help. They may not even be able to connect with family members for days and weeks, leaving them without any financial or emotional support. They can not afford to buy the necessary items and may not even have changing or warm clothing. Those placed in the cell can not talk to their roommates, do not see a psychologist, can not receive information on television, which further aggravates their emotional state. In order to alleviate the difficult conditions of foreign prisoners, it is important to take into account their linguistic and cultural peculiarities as much as possible when they are placed in cells. During the interview, a number of prisoners expressed a desire to be placed in cells with citizens of their own country. In addition to the language barrier, placement with Georgians and third-country nationals in closed-type establishments, where prisoners are held in a cell for 23 hours, becomes also a provocative cause of conflict.222 The prisoners, who were already in the cell with the citizens of their country, said that they had to fight hard for that. Some of them even went on a hunger strike to be moved to another cell by the administration. There are cases in the N8 facility when Georgian prisoners make foreign prisoners to make noise to be transferred to another cell by the administration. The reason for this is that foreign prisoners who do not have the financial means can not buy the necessary items, sweets or cigarettes in the store of the institution and Georgian prisoners have to share those with them. Foreign prisoners in the facility N8 claimed to have changed a number of cells. Frequent cell changes may even amount to illtreatment, given that prisoners are placed in internally classified cells before being transferred from cell At the beginning of 2020, there were 728 foreign prisoners in penitentiary establishments, however, from March 1 to August 20, 2020, 125 foreign convicts left the Georgian penitentiary system and continued their sentences in the country of origin. Summary report on the activities of the Special Penitentiary Service 2020. P.16 https://bit.ly/3oBGnNX [Last visited: 02.02.2021]. 220 Annex to the November 2020 Unified Report on Criminal Statistics of the National Statistics Office of Georgia. P. 116 available at: https://bit.ly/3oHUBwK [Last visited: 15.01.2021]. 221 European Prison Rules 37.1. 222 Prisoners in the same cell with Georgian prisoners in the N8 penitentiary establishment indicate the use of telephone and debit cards against their will, the mandatory daily regime established by Georgian prisoners, the so-called obligation to participate in "communal" and also the fact that Georgian prisoners would not allow them to watch foreign language TV channels. 219 68