Georgian nightmare?

The EU seems to suffering from some kind of mental condition by which they can only operate with a single frame. Even if that frame has lead once to disaster, they still repeat it. This site has pointed out for a long time that Georgia has all the ingredients to be a new crisis in Europe. The country is divided between those who are keen to rush headlong and as quickly as possible into the EU and those who, let’s say, are more keen to not rupture completely with Russia. The latter group probably also hold more traditional and conservative values.

The recent election was won by the Georgian Dream party, by a small margin. Prior to the election opinion polls, reported in Western media, predicted a win for Georgian Dream. [1] So, basically, there is every reason to believe that the election result is valid. The OSCE election monitoring report mentioned observed irregularities. This has been seized on by EU and US elites to claim that the election was rigged. However; other than in the most advanced ‘democracies’ elections are often somewhat marred by irregularities. Furthermore; the overall tone of the OSCE report is in fact quite positive about this election. For example:

The election administration organized the elections efficiently…. largely peaceful election.” and “Yet the engagement shown on election day—from the active voter participation, robust presence of citizen and party observers, and rich diversity of voices—gives the sign of a system that is still growing and evolving, with a democratic vitality under construction.”

[2]

Had the opposition block won and the OSCE reported the same irregularities would the US and EU have been denouncing the elections as rigged? Obviously not. They would have been cherry picking the positive aspects of the OSCE report, or, more likely, would have not mentioned it.

Western media typically refers to opinion polls which show a high level of support for joining the EU in Georgia. That may well be, but, last time I checked, policy in a democracy is made by the elected government, not by opinion polls. There are certainly political questions in the UK where public opinion polls produce a result at variance with the policy of the elected government. We don’t thereby denounce the government or their policy as being illegitimate. It is perfectly possibly that EU membership is popular in Georgia but a majority also support the traditional Georgian Dream party over opposition parties. Yet, the narrative of the Western political-media classes is that the high support for EU membership in polls means that Georgian Dream’s policies are illegitimate.

In May the Georgian Dream party passed a law similar to Russia’s foreign agent law. Under the Georgian law NGOs which receive more than 20% of their funding from abroad have to declare it and publish this information so that the public can see. The EU responded by halting ascension talks and reducing funding. The Western media and political classes denounced this as Georgian Dream taking the country back into Russia’s orbit. It is typically described as a “repressive law” and an “attack on civil society”. The predominantly young pro-EU section of Georgian society went onto the streets and protested. Indeed, they tried to storm parliament. In the last few days, the ruling Georgian Dream party announced they were suspending talks with the EU for a period of time. They reiterated that they remain committed to EU membership and that the suspension related to the conditions of the dialogue imposed on them by the EU. Once again, there are street protests. Even though the information is not given much prominence, Western media reports do note that these protests are far from entirely peaceful. For example; “Some protesters have launched fireworks towards police, started fires and thrown projectiles, while police have been seen charging into and forcibly detaining protesters”. [3] Meanwhile EU and US leaders call for the authorities to “respect peaceful protests”:

Kallas [EU Foreign Policy representative] and EU enlargement commissioner Marta Kos also released a joint statement that reiterated the EU’s “serious concerns about the continuous democratic backsliding of the country” and urged Georgian authorities to “respect the right to freedom of assembly and freedom of expression, and refrain from using force against peaceful protesters, politicians and media representatives [4]

So; protestors, against the decisions of an elected government, can try to storm parliament and attack police but the police should “refrain from using force”. Does this sound familiar? We even have “hymn singing protestors” again:

An AFP reporter saw several dozen young protesters standing still in front of a wall of masked riot police, singing the Georgian national anthem. Others took refuge in a church opposite the parliament while hundreds were hit by teargas.

If we consider the “controversial” NGO law we can rapidly see that the “controversy” is simply something invented by the Western political-media classes to use as a lever against any forces in Georgia which do not embody their values. What they are really upset about is not that this law is “repressive” but that it exposes their regime change operations. The EU has been funding projects in Georgia. I don’t know if US Aid is active, or perhaps various Western foundations. If they are, why should a Georgian citizen not know about this? Why, exactly, is a law which requires organisation to be transparent about who is behind them “an attack on civil society”? Strangely enough, the UK has a very similar law. Charities which receive large donations (greater than GBP 25,000.00) from abroad, must declare them to the Charity Commission. [5] I asked the Charity Commission for the total sum received from abroad by UK charities in 2023. The answer is a staggering GBP 9,737,450,877.00 – nearly 10 billion GBP! I have asked the Charity Commission if they will give me the figures for any particular charity. The answer is that any such request would be considered on a case by case basis; so, potentially. In which case; this law is similar to the Georgian NGO law, except that in the UK a member of the public has to ask for the figure whereas in Georgia the information is automatically surfaced by default. It seems to me that one can make a case that the Georgian version of this law is more transparent than the UK law, where the authorities do collect the information, but decide whether to release it on a case by case basis.

So; once again, EU leaders and the US State Department are stirring up trouble. As always, they are producing a one-sided and simplistic narrative. As in Ukraine the protestors who are in fact violently trying to overturn the policies of an elected government are applauded and hailed as the real and indeed only legitimate voice in the country. It is straight out of the regime change playbook. The situation is directly analogous to what happened in Ukraine. It has the potential to be another disaster. These people do not seem capable of doing anything other than repeating a single playbook. They are literally like a broken machine stuck in an endless repeat loop.

Notes

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