More than a month of protests wasn't enough: in Georgia the law against foreign influences was passed, desired by the ruling Georgian Dream party and renamed the "Russian law" by the opposition due to its similarity to the one that allowed the Moscow authorities to put to silence most dissenting voices.
Parliament approved the legislation at third reading while demonstrations continued outside the building and after a physical clash also occurred between deputies inside the chamber. With 84 votes in favor and 30 against, parliamentarians gave the green light to the law, according to which non-governmental organizations and media that receive more than 20% of their funding from abroad will have to register administratively as «organizations that defend foreign interests".
The President of the Republic, Salome Zourabishvili, who is against the law, has already announced that she will veto it. Within two weeks he will have to send it back to Parliament, but with the obligation to propose an alternative text which can be accepted or rejected in its entirety by the assembly, without the possibility of mediation.
The clashes
Demonstrations against the initiative have followed one another since April 9th, when Sogno Georgiano decided to re-present the law, which it had withdrawn a year ago under the pressure of a similar wave of protests. And even today, after the announcement of the approval, a group of protesters broke through part of the metal barriers placed to protect the entrance to Parliament and the police in riot gear reacted with water cannons to disperse the crowd.
In European chancelleries there is concern about street violence which could lead to a destabilization of a key country for the security of the Caucasus. On the other hand, the challenge seems to take on a value that goes beyond the fate of the law, between those who want to try to recover relations with Russia and those who are instead pushing for a specific Western choice . Two poles represented by the governing party on one side and, on the other, by the president, who is of French origin and in the past was ambassador of Paris to Georgia.
Towards the EU
European Union spokesman Peter Stano reiterated his opposition to the legislation, stating that its adoption "is a serious obstacle in Georgia's path to entry into the EU". Tbilisi obtained candidate country status last December , but to start negotiations it will have to demonstrate, by next October, that it has launched reforms to adapt to a series of requirements in various fields, including transparency, freedom of expression, the fight against corruption and the end of the power of the oligarchs. The USA had also asked for the withdrawal of the law, believing that it could lead to a "stifling of dissent and freedom of expression". Russia, however, claims that it is "an internal affair of Georgia" and denies any interference. At the same time, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov condemned what he called "discovered interference" by Western countries.
(Unioneonline/D)
