48 LAW-ENFORCEMENT EQUIPMENT IN CENTRAL ASIA AND THE SOUTH CAUCASUS non-violent methods of crowd dispersal. There was no apparent measured or proportionate escalation of the use of force either to disperse demonstrators or to respond to sporadic violence.120 The protests in Georgia (and particularly the 2007 protests) demonstrate that, without proper oversight and control, law-enforcement officials may easily misuse the equipment available to them. It is difficult to state what the police response may have been had large quantities of tear gas and rubber bullets not been available to them. However, it is certain that the use of such large quantities of riot-control ammunition, and the indiscriminate way in which such devices were used, hastened the end of the Saakashvili regime. The irony is, therefore, that the indiscriminate use of riot control agents hastened the end of the Soviet Union’s hold on Georgia, and may have had a similar effect on Georgia’s first democratically elected president. An area that requires further scrutiny relates to the equipment authorized for use under Georgia’s new Law on Imprisonment, which came into force on 1 August 2014. This list includes acoustic devices, tear gas and pepper spray, rubber truncheons, rubber bullets, and a range of mechanical-restraint devices, including restraint chairs, restraint beds and straitjackets. Such devices, in particular restraint chairs, have been highlighted as of particular concern because of their potential for misuse. The European Commission has added certain types of these devices to the prohibited list of EC Regulation 1236/2005. It is, therefore, interesting to note that the Law on Imprisonment was developed in part with help from the EU–Council of Europe Joint Programme on Human Rights in Prisons and Other Closed Institutions, and yet they have not specified exactly which types of devices (shackles vs. straps) are authorised for use. The EU and the Council of Europe also launched a project in 2013 aiming to ‘focus on the improvement of prison healthcare and mental healthcare and the fight against impunity for ill-treatment in penitentiary facilities and closed institutions in Georgia’.121 The guidelines for the use of such devices state: (b) A straight jacket, restraint chair, restraint bed—for a person who tried to injure himself or others and/or who is likely to injure or harm another person or damage state property; whose actions are prominently aggressive. The instruments of restraint shall be used under the supervision of a physician.122 As with the recommendations made in relation to the OSCE’s development of guidelines for law-enforcement officials, the European Commission and the Council of Europe should establish clear guidance on what equipment has legitimate law-enforcement and corrections functions and how such 120 Human Rights Watch (note 44), p. 2. Delegation of the EU to the Council of Europe (2013), New EU/CoE Joint Programme on Human Rights in Georgian Prisons is Signed, 25 March 2013 (25/03/2013), <http://eeas.europa.eu/delegations/council_europe/press_corner/focus/events/2013/20130325_en.htm>. 122 Georgian Minister of Corrections, The Rules and Terms on Types of Instruments of Restraint, their Maintaining, Carrying and Using and on Identification of Persons Entitled to Use Them, Order No. 145, 12 Sep. 2014 [unofficial translation]. 121