On World Book and Copyright Day, Tbilisi became the World Book Capital for one year. The joint project of Tbilisi City Hall and UNESCO was officially opened on April 23 at the "Silk Factory" and the mayor of the capital Kakha Kaladze was handed over the status of the Book Capital by the delegation of Kuala Lumpur City Hall.

World Book Capital is a large-scale project established in 2001 by the decision of the General Conference of UNESCO. The first capital was Madrid, and last year the book capital became Kuala Lumpur, which, despite the global pandemic, successfully implemented the project. The project aims to popularize books and reading, promotes the development of the book industry and all related fields, assists contemporary authors, translators, libraries, publishers.

The Writers' House is one of the main partners of "Tbilisi - World Book Capital" and will cooperate with the Union of Multifunctional Libraries of Tbilisi Municipality throughout the year with several initiatives:

• The Museum of Repressed Writers
• Tbilisi International Festival of Literature
• Literary forum-dialogue
• Writers' residences

Within the frames of "Tbilisi - World Book Capital" the Writers' House will organize the 11^th Annual Literary Forum-Dialogue on July 6-9 this year, within the framework of which up to 10 French-language publishers of fiction and children's literature will visit Tbilisi. The main goal of the literary forum-dialogue is to popularize Georgian literature abroad, to facilitate its translation process and thus develop the field of Georgian publishing. During the specially designed four-day program, the participants will get acquainted with the Georgian book market, current events in the area, meet with Georgian publishers and authors.

During this year, specifically within the frames of the project, the Writers' House and "Tbilisi - World Book Capital" will host various types of residency programs:

• Exchange programs with residences of foreign writers and festivals;
• Residency program for young writers;

The exchange program already plans to collaborate with two residences: a writing residency in La Coruna, Spain and a residence and participation in the Folio Literary Festival in Obidos, Portugal. Obidos has been awarded the status of " UNESCO Creative City of Literature". Within the frames of cooperation with Obidos Residence, the Georgian author will attend the Folio Literary Festival, while the Portuguese author will be a guest of Tbilisi International Festival of Literature.

Writers' House together with "Tbilisi - World Book Capital" will support the Georgian author’s travel, accommodation and work in residence, and in return will host two authors Portugal and Spain.

In 2021, “Tbilisi - World Book Capital” and Tbilisi International Festival of Literature- TIFL will cooperate and at the end of September, will offer an interesting program to book lovers and will host important international authors.

In November-December 2021, a Museum of Repressed Writers will open at the Writers' House. The Museum aims to explore and make available to the public information on writers who have been repressed by the Soviet government since the 1920s. The project is implemented in collaboration with the Soviet Research Laboratory.

World Book Capital was established in 2002 by the decision of the General Conference of UNESCO. It aims to popularize books and reading, promotes the development of the book industry and all related fields, assists contemporary authors, translators, libraries, publishers.

UNESCO project "Tbilisi - World Book Capital" is implemented at the initiative of Tbilisi City Hall and with the support of the Bank of Georgia.