Georgia at a Crossroad
The history is repeating itself: what is happening in Georgia seems echoing what had happened in Ukraine ten years before during the 2014 Maidan Revolution when Ukraine’s then President Yanukovych abruptly suspended all the preparations for a planned association agreement with the EU to favour closer economic ties with Russia. The unexpected event sparked widespread protests that were violently repressed by the riot police and was followed later by the escalation of Russian troops in Crimea.
Now, going back to 2024, imaging living in the city of Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia, where every night thousands of demonstrators pour into the streets to express their outrage against their pro-Russian government’s controversial policy and their bitterness to see how years of constant struggle to an EU integration starts to unravel, piece by piece.
What led to protests?
The protests are driven by grievances that have been simmering for months: starting from the enactment of a contentious measure that required any organisation that gets more than 20% of its funding from Western sources to register as an “agent of foreign influence”, further pushing Georgia away from its long-desired path to an EU membership. Indeed, the law has been nicknamed being a “Russian-style law” by 30 MEPs in a letter to Josep Borrell, the European Commission Vice-President and High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, denouncing the “continued undemocratic behavior of the Georgian authorities” and warning about a potential suspension of the EU candidate’s status if the country keeps running counter to the nine steps to which the government committed itself when it was granted the EU candidate status.
The crisis further intensified in October when the hope that a new parliamentary election could eventually provide a resolution for the country’s deep political polarization became forlorn. In fact, the currently ruling Georgian Dream party (GD) won the election for the fourth time with 54% of votes. The party has been in power for the last 12 years, known for its pro-Russian and anti-Western ideology. This victory symbolized for many Georgians not only the gradual approach to an autocratic regime but also the very end of Georgia’s European Dream by eroding its democracy as proved by the enactment of the “foreign agent law” (previously mentioned) and anti-LGBTQ laws, clearly in contrast with European democratic values.
Corruption and fraudulence have been reported over the legitimacy of the election in a country where up to 80% of the population supports joining the EU, as shown by the polls. The opposition refused to concede defeat and accused the ruling party of a “constitutional coup” while Georgia’s pro-EU President Salome Zourabichvili, who has a mostly ceremonial political power under Georgia's constitution, affirms that the country had fallen victim to a “Russian special operation”, declaring the election results as “a total falsification” and calling Georgians to protest against the result.
On November 28th, the European Parliament passed a resolution citing alleged irregularities and declaring the election unfair. Irakli Kobakhidze, Georgia’s prime minister, denounced the measure as interference in Georgia’s internal affairs.
However, the last straw that broke the camel’s back occurred when the government announced its decisions to refuse any European budgetary support and to stop the process of joining the European Union at least until 2028, despite an article in its own constitution that sets EU integration as a national priority (art.78). This decision sent an evident message to Brussel, slamming the brakes on its European integration journey.
The public outrage
Mr. Kobakhidze, Georgia’s PM, insisted that EU negotiation has not been “suspended” but rather “delayed”. He accuses the EU of exploiting the accession negotiation process to “blackmail” against Georgia, demanding reforms and imposing sanctions that are “infringing our dignity” and claiming that it is “categorically unacceptable” for Georgians to join the EU “as beggars”.
In fact, the GD party has approved a program entitled “Only with Peace, Dignity, Prosperity to Europe”, aiming to secure EU membership by 2030 without “selling out” its national sovereignty. However, this is insufficient to placate the crowds who still remind the grief from the 2008 Five-Day war against the Russian-backed separatist forces in the Georgian regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
The threat of the government to suffocate Georgia’s democracy pushed tens of thousands of demonstrators to take to the streets of the capital to protest. “We will not let this self-proclaimed prime minister destroy our European future”, said a protester reported by the Guardian. Gathering every night in front of the parliament, they powerfully wave the white-and-red Georgian flag along with the blue-and-yellow European flag as a symbol of freedom and people’s hope for democracy and justice.
At the head of the protests is the Georgian pro-EU President Salome Zourabichvili who has confronted the riot police in Tbilisi and refused to end her term this month, vowing to remain in office until “a legitimately elected parliament is formed”. The only pleased seemed to be not only Moscow, welcoming the suspension and praising GD’s “courage”, but also the Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán who had congratulated GD for not letting Georgia become “a second Ukraine”.
While the dissatisfaction and resentment grow exponentially, repression and use of violence have intensified among the police. Water cannons, tear gas, arrest of civilians and deliberate targets at journalists: all tactics that were familiar to those used by Russian President Vladimir Putin and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko to suppress the public outcry, a sign of a dangerous shift towards authoritarianism.
“This violent regime is evidently doing everything to undermine the interests of Georgia and the Georgian people, to intimidate Georgian citizens so that they stop resisting the Russian criminal regime. Ivanishvili's government is afraid of the people because only the people can end this lawlessness”, as stated by Transparency International, a Georgian human rights watchdog.
The EU's reaction
Already since the adoption of the Law on Transparency of Foreign Influence in October, the European Commission has declared to pull back €121 million financial support as result of Georgia’s democratic backsliding, further complicated by the approval of the highly controversial bill which has been dubbed as an “anti-LGBTQ bill” by its opponent.
In a recent EU statement, concerns and solidarity have been expressed in support of Georgian people, recognizing that “it was the Georgian Dream’s course of action that led to the de facto halt of the EU accession process”. The European Union heavily condemns the intentional violence carried out by the police and expresses urgent necessity for the country to have a clear framework. This includes:
New elections that will take place without pressure and under free and fair conditions;
An immediate end to violence and the indiscriminate detention of protesters;
The consistent introduction of sanctions by European states against representatives of the “Georgian Dream”, including bans and asset freezes;
An immediate release of the detained demonstrators;
Respecting the mandate of the incumbent president until fair and free new elections have taken place.
And now what?
Georgia’s future political orientation now hangs in balance. The outcome of this national fight will determine whether the country will fulfill the will of the overwhelming majority of its citizens to align with the West or fall under Moscow’s sphere of influence and experience a Belarus similar scenario. Fear of Russia imperils Georgian democracy but it might be its best hope, too. Georgians are ready to fight until the end. Can they rely on their Western partners to back them?
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