Thousands protest Georgian draft law

Bill seen as inspired by the Kremlin

TBILISI, Georgia — Thousands of demonstrators marched toward Georgia’s parliament on Wednesday, protesting a draft law on “foreign agents” that critics say highlights the country’s democratic backsliding and pushes it closer to Moscow.

As the evening went on, a group of protesters tried to storm the government building, but were repelled by police officers who used water cannons, stun grenades and tear gas to deter the crowd.

Later, riot police officers in helmets and with shields used all those measures, along with smoke grenades, to push the crowd away from the parliament building. Police have been making sporadic arrests, and some protesters attempted to respond with force, turning one police car upside down.

The demonstrations came one day after riot police officers used tear gas, water cannons and arrests to disperse a largescale rally there.

Georgia, a mountainous country of 3.6 million people, is strategically positioned in the middle of the Caucasus, a region that for centuries has been the arena for a geopolitical tug of war between Russia, Turkey, Western states and Iran. The war in Ukraine has exacerbated the already polarized internal politics of Georgia, where the vocally pro-Western opposition has accused the governing party of siding with Russia.

Charles Michel, the president of the European Council, the group of EU heads of government, said Wednesday that he was “strongly concerned about developments” in Georgia.

Opposition lawmakers and members of nongovernmental organizations vowed to return to the center of the city in bigger numbers later Wednesday to protest the draft law. The opposition also called on supporters to protest in other cities across the country.

Georgia’s interior ministry on Tuesday accused protesters of using violence against the police. The ministry said in a statement that its officers had detained 66 protesters overnight and charged them with hooliganism and disobedience.

Although Georgia’s government enjoys a comfortable majority in parliament, the country’s nongovernmental organization sector and many major news media outlets side with the opposition. The draft law on “foreign influence” is widely seen by them as an attempt to replicate similar Russian legislation to exert pressure on the country’s vibrant civil society.

The legislation would require nongovernmental groups and media outlets that receive more than 20% of their funding from a “foreign power” to register as “agents of foreign influence.” Violations would incur hefty fines.

The bill — backed by the governing Georgian Dream party and the country’s prime minister — made it through a first reading on Tuesday and is expected to also be approved in second and third readings. Salome Zourabichvili, the country’s president, said she would veto it, but her role has limited power and the governing party has enough votes to override.

Irakli Kobakhidze, the chairman of the governing Georgian Dream party, said on Wednesday that the opposition had used “unprecedented violence” against law enforcement. He said the draft bill had been sent for consideration to the Venice Commission, a consultative body of the Council of Europe.

The commission is set to give its conclusions in a few months, he said, although members of the governing party said they would support the law regardless of what European bodies decided.

Georgia’s vocal pro-Western opposition sees the law as following the model of Russian legislation passed in 2012, which the Kremlin used to stigmatize civil society. Some 400 nongovernmental organizations and media groups signed a petition declaring that “Russian law is not the will of Georgia.”

The bill has been met with almost universal condemnation from Western governments and civil society organizations. In a statement, the U.S. Embassy in Tbilisi called the draft law “Kremlin-inspired” and said it would “damage Georgia’s relations with its strategic partners.”

Georgia fought a painful fiveday war with Russia in 2008, during which the Kremlin took military control of a fifth of the country’s territory. Members of Georgia’s opposition argue that the government in Tbilisi could do more to support Ukraine’s efforts to repel Russia’s invasion, but Georgia has refrained from imposing sanctions on Moscow.