Georgia: Law of Foreign Agents Provokes Protests for Two Days in a Row

On Tuesday, for the second consecutive day, a hundred demonstrators gathered in front of the Parliamentary building of Georgia, in the capital Tiblisi, to protest against the approval of the law of foreign agents.

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The proposed bill indicates that Georgian organizations, including NGOs, which receive more than 20 per cent of their funding from abroad register as foreign agents or will face sanctions.

Police officers have already been deployed in the area to control the crowd, prevent a break-in to the parliament building and prevent riots.

Despite some areas of tension, the demonstration was peaceful. However, more law enforcement officials are moving to the protest area.

The demonstrations against the Foreign Agents Act are not new this year, because during 2023, massive protests shook Tiblisi in rejection of the first reading of said law.

The document was rejected by the opposition party, Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili, and diplomatic corps, including the EU mission and the US Embassy. in Georgia.

For the majority rejection, the Georgian parliament eliminated the bill in 2023, however, at the beginning of April this year the ruling party resubmitted the Bill to present it.

According to Georgian diplomats and politicians, the draft Law on Foreign Agents will make it difficult for Georgia to join the European Union.