Scores detained amid crackdown

GEORGIA detained 63 people during a protest against the ‘‘foreign agents’ Bill’’ in Tbilisi and six police officers were injured, Georgia’s interior ministry said, citing Deputy Minister Aleksandre Darakhvelidze. Security forces used water cannon, tear gas and stun grenades against protesters outside parliament yesterday.

Witnesses saw some police officers physically attack protesters, who threw eggs and bottles at them, before using tear gas, water cannon and stun grenades to force demonstrators from the area outside the Sovietbuilt parliament building.

Levan Khabeishvili, the leader of Georgia’s largest opposition party, the United National Movement, posted a picture on X with his face bloodied and sporting a black eye.

A party official said Khabeishvili was beaten by police after disappearing from central Tbilisi.

After being dispersed from parliament, about 2000 protesters continued to block Tbilisi’s main Rustaveli Ave, barricading it with cafe tables and rubbish bins. Some shouted ‘‘slaves’’ and ‘‘Russians’’ at police.

Earlier, riot police used pepper spray and batons to clear some protesters who were trying to prevent lawmakers from leaving the back entrance of parliament.

Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili, an avowed foe of the government whose powers are mostly ceremonial, said in a post on X the crackdown had been ‘‘totally unwarranted, unprovoked and out of proportion’’, and that the protests had been peaceful.

The Bill has heightened divisions in the deeply polarised country, setting the ruling Georgian Dream party against a protest movement backed by opposition groups, civil society, celebrities and the figurehead president.

Parliament, which is controlled by the Georgian Dream and its allies, is likely to approve the Bill, which must pass two more readings before becoming law.

Lawmakers ended yesterday’s session without a vote and the debate will resume today.

The Bill would require organisations receiving more than 20% of their funding from abroad to register as ‘‘foreign agents’’. On Tuesday, a governmentorganised rally in support of the Bill was attended by tens of thousands of people, many of whom had been bussed in from provincial towns by the ruling party. — Reuters

PHOTO: REUTERS Blasted . . . A woman reacts as law enforcement officers use a water cannon to disperse the crowd near the parliament building, during a rally to protest against a Bill on ‘‘foreign agents’’ in Tbilisi, Georgia, yesterday.