The Weekend Intelligence: Georgia... the day after tomorrow

This episode discusses the controversial Foreign Influence Law in Georgia and its implications for the nation's relationship with the West and internal politics.

1. The Foreign Influence Law could stigmatize civil society and push Georgia towards authoritarianism.
2. Public protests and opposition are strong, reflecting widespread disapproval of the law and fear of Russian-style governance.
3. Attacks on activists and political figures are intensifying, suggesting state complicity.
4. The law threatens Georgia's European Union membership aspirations.
5. The episode underscores a pivotal moment for Georgian democracy and its place in Europe.

1: Introduction

Hosts introduce the controversy surrounding Georgia's Foreign Influence Law and its implications. Jason Palmer: "The future of Georgia, there's a lot to unpack here."

2: On the Ground in Georgia

Firsthand accounts from Georgians who have been directly impacted by the law and the ensuing violence. Gia Japaridze: "First we are named as foreign influence agents, then we are imprisoned like agents."

3: The Broader Context

Discussion on how similar laws have affected other nations and the potential future for Georgia. Heidi Pett: "It's a popular tactic among those with autocratic tendencies."

1. Stay informed about international laws affecting civil liberties.
2. Support NGOs and organizations advocating for democracy and human rights.
3. Engage in peaceful protests and public discourse to voice opposition to similar laws.
4. Educate others about the implications of such laws on society and democracy.
5. Participate in or support international watchdog activities that monitor such laws and their impacts.

The introduction laws cracking down on supposed foreign agents has become a common tactic for autocratic leaders. Activists in Georgia, who oppose the introduction of such a law, refer to theirs as “the Russian law”. They see it as moving their country closer to Putin, and away from the West.

Last week, as Georgia’s parliament prepared to vote on the law, Heidi Pett travelled to Tbilisi, the capital, to meet opposition leaders and find out why they are so afraid. What she discovered was a group being beaten, bruised, and left worried for their personal freedom—wondering, once the dust settles, what the day after tomorrow will bring.

People

Jason Palmer, Heidi Pett, Gia Japaridze

Content Warnings:

None

Jason Palmer
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Heidi Pett
The. Economist on the surface of it, it sounds like sensible policy legislation that forces organizations which receive funds from abroad to register as foreign entities, notionally keeping domestic politics domestic. But in Georgia, the law on transparency of foreign influence put forward by the ruling Georgian Dream party has caused is still causing chaos.

Jason Palmer
The story goes back more than a year, when it was just a draft circulating around parliament. A scuffle broke out and opposition lawmakers were expelled. The next day, the first of many enormous protests outside parliament, with plenty of opposition politicians in attendance. This law, which targets civil society, is just a part of the bigger picture, bigger anatomy of treason. When we have a regime which sees the west and the free world as their enemy and tries to cultivate this putinist idea in a society and betrays.

Heidi Pett
The future of Georgia, theres a lot. To unpack in there. Targeting civil society, a putinist idea. What plenty of Georgians know is that this law mirrors one that Russia enacted in 2012. In practice, it casts civil society organizations as manipulative agents of foreign powers and gives the government the COVID to shut them down.

Jason Palmer
It's a popular tactic among those with autocratic tendencies. In February, 1 took effect in Hungary under Viktor Orban. In April, Kyrgyzstan, Slovakia's prime minister, Robert Fizzo, who was brutally gunned down earlier this month, had started his fourth term by promising similar legislation. The people of Georgia know all of this. They also know that since late last year, their country is on the road toward EU membership.

This kind of law is likely to threaten that path. Even Georgias own president, Chalamet Zorbishvili, vetoed the bill last week. But there are, to put it mildly, some shadowy forces now at work. Several opposition figures, like Dmitry Cicovani have been attacked, beaten up by masked men in black. Broken nose, broken cheekbones, concussion and, like, numerous bruises.

Translator
And I was in the hospital for two days. Then I have this. I was advised to stay at home, but I couldn't. He couldn't because for him, and for many Georgians, too much is at stake.

Jason Palmer
I'm Jason Palmer and this is the weekend intelligence. Last week, Heidi Pett traveled to Georgia to meet some of the people who, like Mister Cicovani, had been ambushed and to try to find out who's behind the attacks. What she found is people worried for their personal freedom. First we are named as foreign influence agents, then we are imprisoned like agents. It happened in Russia.

Gia Japaridze
This is a russian playbook. And for the future of their country. If Georgia fails, the whole region fails. Maybe the fate of Europe is decided now in Tbilisi. So it's not only Georgians fight, this is fight for Europe too.

Heidi Pett
Do you mind? Because you've still got some bruising on your face. Yeah, of course. Sorry. I just.

I don't want you to feel like a piece of meat. No, no problem. No problem. For georgian government, I'm just a piece of meat. I've got my camera right up in Gia Japaridza's face and I feel sort of bad.

He's a charismatic and dignified man of 50, graying hair cropped the same length as his beard. And he's got a mischievous sense of humour away with words that shouldnt maybe be a surprise. My first education is classical philology. Me and Boris Johnson have the same education. But then I studied international relations and I joined the Ministry of Foreign affairs of Georgia.

For the past decade or so, hes been teaching politics and international relations to university students in Tbilisi, Georgias capital. But in a previous life and a previous era in georgian politics, he was a diplomat. For ten years I was in this service. I worked for Georgian Ministry of Foreign affairs, serving in different countries Greece, Cyprus, Portugal. In 2013, soon after georgian dream came to power, Gere was put into a kind of forced retirement from the diplomatic service.

He says it was made pretty clear to him that this was because of the activities of his brother, who's a libertarian politician that he jokes has ruined his life. And in the decades since, Gere has also become known as a pro democracy activist. He's on the board of an ngo that teaches civics to young people. And for the past month, he's been attending the protests and speaking publicly about his concerns over the foreign agents bill. And that's why I'm here standing in his office at the university where he teaches, asking him to lift his shirt, showing me his bruised and broken skin, and trying to connect the dots.

Let's go back five days to the 8 May.

It's a week before the bill is due for its final passage through the georgian parliament, and Guia starts getting menacing phone calls. I started receiving calls on my mobile phone, on my cell phone, since the early morning. The first two calls were from the number registered in Chad. I don't have relatives and friends in Chad. Then I received another two calls from another number with international code.

Gia Japaridze
The fifth call was from georgian number. It was calls that many people received in Georgia, cursing and threatening us, saying why we are against russian law, saying different things like, we're gonna kill you, we're gonna bring your body to your family, and things like this. But undeterred, he puts on a suit and goes out to a reception at the polish embassy in Tbilisi, where he speaks to several foreign diplomats about the situation in Georgia. When he drives home at about 11:30 p.m. he has a feeling that something isn't right.

Strangely, there was a parking place for my car in front of my house. I parked my car, I got out from my car, locked the car, crossed this driveway heading to the entrance, and I was in front of the entrance, few meters from the entrance, maybe four or 5 meters from the entrance, I saw this vault courier guy, and I thought, God, maybe they sent someone dressed in Courier's dress. And at that moment I got blows from both sides. From behind, I could not see the faces. I turned around and I saw like a baseball bat, white collar, huge stick coming to my head.

I started defending myself, but of course I could not, because at least two or three or maybe four, maybe five, I don't know. Because it is difficult when you are defending. It is difficult to understand how many people are beating you. So at least two or at least three from all sides. Then I fell down and they continued beating me by foot, by these sticks.

I think it continued maybe 1 minute. They were very aggressive, of course, cursing while beating me. One of them said something like, so you are against the law, or why you are against the law? He mentioned the law, the russian law.

Heidi Pett
Suddenly the attackers stop and they're gone. Guer is covered in blood. It runs into his eyes from a gash on the top of his head. He picks himself up and calls the police to report it and eventually makes his way to hospital. The doctors decided that I have to stay in the hospital for a short period.

Gia Japaridze
Actually, I stayed there for two nights and now I continue this medical treatment at home. But it is difficult. Georgia is on a crossroad and in this difficult time it's very difficult to stay home.

I can show you my. Okay, that's it. My arm.

Same.

Heidi Pett
Gia's upper arm is shaded purple, yellow and green from shoulder to elbow. He's got twin bruises on his back so dark they're almost black. They look like enormous Rorschach blots folded over his spine, right over his kidneys. He's got stitches on the top of his head, cuts on his face and a juicy black eye. Has anything like this ever happened to you?

Gia Japaridze
No. Never. Not even in soviet times? Never. I was born in Soviet Union, but I don't remember something like this because in Georgia, if you attack a person from behind suddenly, without saying any word, it is not considered as a right action.

Heidi Pett
A side note here, I'm not sure that there are any cultures where attacking someone from behind is considered fair play at home. In Australia, we'd call it a dog act. But Ghia is not the only one I speak to this week who really wants to emphasise that it is specifically shocking and somehow ungeorgian to do this. Even in soviet times there was like a cold. You don't pass this, you know, these limits.

Gia Japaridze
So to attack someone from behind, ambushed somewhere, it's not good. According to georgian mentality. He's also not the only Georgian to have been ambushed and assaulted this week.

Heidi Pett
Georgia feels like its taken a dark turn and the capital is awash with rumour about exactly how and why the governing party georgian dream, is pushing the line that a malevolent organization theyre calling the global war party is trying to drag the country into the war in Ukraine. Hence the need for this foreign influence law. To many people in Tbilisi, this looks like subterfuge. They fear instead that the government is deliberately sabotaging its relationship with the west so that they can turn to the georgian public and say, we had no choice but to align with Russia. This would certainly suit georgian dreams.

Reclusive founder Betzina Ivanishvili, the countrys richest man who built his fortune and relationships in Russia in the nineties. He still has close ties there. He served as prime minister for a year when georgian dream came to power, and he remains an enormously powerful figure behind the scenes. There's talk of state capture, a judicial and political system enthralled to a multi billionaire and the deep patronage network he's built, and of politicians blackmailed into toeing the party line. This all makes Georgia a strange place to work as a journalist.

Conspiracies swirl everywhere, but evidence is obscured. When you try and probe for sources or documentation, the reply is often a shrug. People say, everyone knows this is how it is. But in the case of gears attack, we can begin to join the dots. For one thing, while Guia says he's not a political person, his position on the bill is well known.

He's even seen by some as a leader of the protests, a characterisation that he disputes. The georgian youth is the leader of this protest. Political parties, Ngo's, academia, people like me, individuals, can just be part of this protest. Yeah, maybe the weight of my words are bigger than any other public figure or politician right now in Georgia, but I don't consider myself as the leader of this protest. No, no.

You're just the one who's got a black eye. And as I've said, his attack wasn't an isolated incident. On the day that Gere receives the first phone call and is attacked on the 8 May, a Wednesday, dozens of other Georgians receive similar threats. An opposition politician called Dmitry Chikovani is also beaten up near his home. The next day, two more opposition politicians, Gyorgi Mumladze and Boris Chelikarua, are attacked.

And the day after that. Now we're on Friday the 10th, there are two more physical assaults. Gyorgy Mleudze is attacked again and an MP from another party named Nodar Chachenidze. Three other opposition figures report masked men waiting outside their homes. The pattern and the message behind it seems clear.

If you're a high profile opponent of the foreign influence law in Georgia, you have reason to fear for your safety. Stay home. Stay silent.

And as for the identity of the attackers, whether they're being actively recruited and directed by the Georgian Dream Party or they're just independent vigilantes who are coalescing around a common cause we don't yet know. As we publish this, not one of them has been apprehended. But Gere himself is in no doubt where the chain of command leads to. I believe that these attacks were organized, planned and implemented by the state. The people who attacked me, they had at least operational technical support.

Gia Japaridze
They knew my route from the reception to my house. They left parking place especially for me, for my car. So they parked their car there. Then they received information that I am coming back to my home. So they took their car from this parking place, left this parking place for my car.

They were ambushed everywhere. It cannot be done without technical and operational support on behalf of state intelligence and security agencies. There's something else which raises guerre's suspicions. Evidence which could have helped to identify his attackers was taken by the police and hasn't been seen since. There is a video camera on the top of the entrance door.

I was beaten in front of this camera. The criminal police took this whole system of this videotaping. They have it in Bureau of Expertise. They told me that they are waiting the expert opinion or something like this from this bureau of expertise in order to have rights to see the tape.

Heidi Pett
The building where Guia lives is a classic of soviet era architecture. Several concrete apartment blocks are arranged around a central courtyard that's now mostly used as a parking space.

And at the end of the courtyard is a small kiosk with a metal roof. Inside, a private security guard that the residents all chip in to pay for. I'm working with a local journalist who's helping me. Door knock around the neighbourhood. We're looking for any extra CCTV.

So we ask the guard if he still has a copy of the tape. When we arrive, he's sitting in a soft armchair with his feet up on the windowsill. A tv playing the daytime news is on in the background. He tells us that he wasn't around at the time of the attack. He was home watching a football game.

And so we ask him about the camera.

Translator
Basically says, I wasn't here at the time of when it happened. And police came here and took all the recordings. You don't have a copy?

He says that device. Recording device. They took it. They took the whole device and channel. Is.

He shows the desktops that he has? No. Oh, so that is supposed to be recording and actually it's supposed to be. Showing the footage from the CCTV. So right now there is no security in this place?

No. So according to the security guard, the police took the whole CCTV recording system, not just the tapes. If the masked men come back for gear this time, there'll be no video evidence at all. And two weeks after the attack, the CCTV system still hasn't been returned. And Gere hasn't seen any of the footage, despite requesting it from the investigating officers.

Heidi Pett
In an attempt to understand what is happening with the police investigation, I've repeatedly requested an interview with the Ministry of Internal affairs, the government department that's responsible for police, but they've declined to speak to me.

On Tuesday, the 14 May, as Guer's bruises begin to turn from an angry purple to sickly yellow, the foreign influence bill goes into its final reading. In the georgian parliament, a crucial step on the road to it becoming law.

As MP's prepare to vote on the bill, a fight breaks out inside the parliament chamber.

Members of georgian dream and the opposition parties grapple with one another. Across the benches, men grab each other's jackets, throw punches. A woman hits someone on the back of the head with a book. But the scuffle doesn't stop the vote from eventually going ahead. And when it does, the bill passes.

With 84 MP's voting for and just 30 against thousands on the streets of Tbilisi. As the parliament in Georgia passes its foreign agents bill, protesters fear it will stifle dissent, Kremlin style.

Tell me about the scene and the mood inside parliament on Tuesday, when the bill passed its third reading.

Tamar Khodzaya
It was a really difficult day. It was emotional and quite depressing. Tamar Khodzaya is originally from Abhazia, one of two breakaway regions of Georgia which split off during a civil war in the early nineties, which is when her family fled. She's dark haired, steely eyed and very accomplished. Before her political career, she worked as a lawyer specializing in press freedom.

Heidi Pett
She was invited to run as a Georgian Dream MP in 2012, and she was excited to be one of a crop of brand new politicians when the party swept to power, thinking it was a time of possibility and change for her country. But she quickly became disillusioned with georgian dream and she left the party for another. Since 2021, Tamar has sat as an independent MP, which quite literally puts her in the middle of the fray. When government and opposition MP's start fighting.

Tamar Khodzaya
I'm not afraid that they will directly assault me. But in this situation, it's impossible to feel safe because if they want to physically assault some other MP's, they have to go through me. We're sitting in a park in downtown Tbilisi the day after the brawl. Tamar can't actually get into her parliamentary office because the building is still subject to emergency security measures. I want to show you.

Gia Japaridze
Okay, where is this? My. She pulls out a phone and shows me a video she took of riot police escorting georgian dream mp's out of the building immediately after the vote. I took this video. Can you see how the riot police are rushing them all out?

Tamar Khodzaya
And here there's a traffic jam to leave the parliament building. She's saddened by what's happened to parliament in the last week. The building is empty most of the time. There's no staff, except for when the government has legislation to push through.

They do it all the time. As soon as they're done with passing a law, they empty the parliament, forcing us to exit the building, leaving parliament basically deserted. After that, riot police weld shut the gates of the building. And so because one of the things that is difficult to understand from the outside is why georgian dream has done this. Now.

Its a really good question. Why now? As I understand it, this isnt only about the foreign agents law. It has something to do with the geopolitical situation going on. We cant talk about this law separately from another law, which parliament also passed, the offshore law.

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Heidi Pett
While the foreign influence law is the one that sparked these mass protests, this offshore law comes up again and again in conversations I have with political insiders in Georgia. They tell me that it is the real kicker. It was passed under an accelerated process in April and means that money from overseas can be transferred to Georgia untaxed. This, in turn, means that Georgia could be a safe haven for capital targeted by western sanctions, for example, assets belonging to russian oligarchs, or indeed, to Bidzina Ivanishvili, the shadowy billionaire and georgian dream founder who I mentioned earlier to Tamar. The combination of this offshore law and the foreign influence law feels like a calculated attempt to align the country with Vladimir Putin's Russia, a view which is shared by many of the protesters who've been surrounding the parliament building for the previous couple of days.

In spite of the grim political backdrop, the mood at these protests has mostly been upbeat. The crowd are predominantly young, the kind of Gen Z kids you'd see in any city around the world, only that a number of them have respirators or gas masks around their necks. And as I move through the streets with my camera and microphone, I see that many of them have come out draped in georgian flags and almost as many covered in the flag of the EU. And they often break out into a chant, Sakatvelo is Georgia in Georgian, the name of the country they're so afraid of losing.

I run into one group of young protesters who are playing the unofficial anthem of the EU, Beethoven's ode to joy on a melodica, one of those portable keyboards you blow into to make a sound.

At one point, I'm able to get access to a balcony, and from up there I can properly see the thousands below. It's been raining on and off for days, and most of them are dressed in cheap, multi coloured plastic ponchos. From above, they look like rainbow confetti.

But there's another presence in this picture too. At the edges of the crowds, hemming them in and occasionally pushing them back, are thousands of police officers, decked out all in black, from balaclava to boots. Every so often, a group of them advance into the crowd to seize a protester, pulling them back behind police lines under a hail of blows. From a distance, these forays seem random, but look closer and you can tell that a plan is being carefully executed. I had a chance to appeal to the policemen, all the policemen of the special forces unit.

David Katsurava is a 40 year old former bodybuilder. He's now an activist in south Ossetia, a breakaway region of Georgia where russian forces have been stationed since 2008. It's not far from Tbilisi, just over an hour's drive away. David founded an organisation which monitors the activities of russian troops in south Ossetia and charts their encroachments further into georgian territory. On the 14 May, the encroachment he was more worried about was inside the parliament building.

So David was in Tbilisi at the protest.

What you're hearing is a video taken there and uploaded to social media. It shows David in a khaki jacket and a green scarf, addressing a line of masked special forces officers who stand about five metres away from him. I appealed to them that they are on the wrong side. And I said that in 40 km, russian troops are staying and we don't know when they're going to invade again to Georgia, and that we have to fight together to stay together. And today they are just serving russian government, russian law, and that they are staying on the russian side.

Gia Japaridze
This was my statement.

Heidi Pett
It doesn't go down well.

Gia Japaridze
I even did not manage to finish it when I was caught by a group of these policemen. A gang of the masked officers jump forward and grab him. And they caught me and brought behind this unit. He's pulled behind the police lines. About ten men start hitting him from all directions.

It was really unimaginable how they were beating me. They were aiming on my face, head, my body, and it did not stop. I could imagine that they were doing it in a car. And I knew that no, it was. It has no sense even to cry or to ask somebody to help or something.

Like this. David tells me the attack continues for about 35 minutes.

Heidi Pett
Finally, he notices that one of the men is taking a video of him. When I was beaten fifth time, they made a footage and I heard that he had to send it somewhere to show the result. My head was. I had two additional heads. My face was absolutely in the blood, my eyes was absolutely closed, nose broken.

David is sure that video was sent to a superior, who decided that he'd been sufficiently beaten up. And I was lucky, because this fifth bateman, when they did this execution, fifth time, it was successful. And that who ordered my execution, was very satisfied with the result. And then they transferred me. After this fifth execution, they transferred me to the police patrol group, which then brought me to the main police station.

Gia Japaridze
And when they saw Mike and condition, they called for the ambulance. And then I was brought to this clinic in Gorokwa clinic, where I needed argent surgery, because all the bones were broken, my face, and I almost lost my eye. But hopefully the doctors recovered it.

Heidi Pett
The white of David's left eye is not white. The whole thing is blood red. His face is swollen from both the beating and the surgery. He's had to put him back together again. He's got new metal plates in his cheekbone and his jaw.

To stabilise the multiple broken bones, he lifts the collar of his shirt. Underneath, there are dark ligature marks, bruises two or three inches wide, and a ring all round his neck, where he says police officers strangled him with his scarf. And like Ghia, David feels sure this wasn't a random act of violence. His assailants, these police officers, they knew exactly who he was. I think that I was specially selected by them.

Gia Japaridze
When they were beating me, they were talking and sending messages why I am beaten. So there were some questions, for example, why I are you walking alongside of the occupation line? They know exactly that. Last seven years, patrolling as a civil activist occupational line and making monitoring missions alongside of the occupied so called South Ossetia. Now we started patrolling alongside of the line at the abrasia.

They know my activities, they know that I was fighting in Ukraine. They know that I am protester.

I think that also they wanted to show society that we beat David, who is rather well known as a civilian activists, and we will be in this way. They wanted to frighten these free people protesting against the russian law. But in my opinion, so it was a really big mistake, because nobody is frightened, even when they look at your face. As soon as I will be recovered, so I will go back to the occupation line, also to the streets together with protector protesters and I will continue fighting because I know that we are losing our country.

Heidi Pett
David and Ghia are not the only ones who believe they're losing their country. In fact, that's the reason the government says it needs to introduce the foreign influence law in the first place, that Georgia and its values are under threat from western ideas propagated by an NGO sector awash with us and EU money.

Do you think that family values in Georgia are under threat?

Translator
We are, as a nation in Georgia, we are facing the influence of foreign powers and some of them want to introduce or legalize same sex marriage in Georgia. And he's saying that it will be end of everything in Georgia for himself. It's Friday, May 17, three days after the foreign agents bill has passed, and there's a very different crowd gathering on Rustavelli Avenue outside parliament. Older women, their hair covered in scarves, holding framed icons, robed priests from the Georgian Orthodox Church, families with small children waving georgian flags. Traditional poems and prayers ring out over a pa.

Heidi Pett
Theyre all here for family purity day, which the government has declared a public holiday this year for the first time. The date is complicated. The first of these purity rallies was held in 2014, on the anniversary of a homophobic riot that happened the year before. Thousands of men descended on central Tbilisi and beat up a small group of activists who were trying to hold a pride march. This is Georgia at its most conservative.

And so why did you decide to come down here today?

Translator
For me, it's the most important thing is our religion, our Christianity, which we received from our ancestors. It's most important thing, as well as family. Holiness is the most important thing and we need to prioritize families over the other matters.

Heidi Pett
But while many of the people I spoke to were strong on defence georgian values, no one spoke out actively against the EU. Quite the reverse, actually. What do you think about Georgia joining the EU and also the EU saying that if Georgia passes this foreign agents bill, you can't become part of the EU.

Translator
So I'm not resisting and I'm in favor of joining European Union by. I wanted to rejoin European Union with our own values, with our own principles, and we don't want to interfere in our cis values or in other manner for european. And I'm full support of european, but only in the case where our principles, our historical values are dependent and not interfered from foreign powers.

Heidi Pett
In the past, when the georgian public has surveyed about whether or not it wants to join the EU, the results are consistently high. 80% or more of the population says they want to join something that came a step closer last December when the country was granted candidate status. And of course, things have taken a sharp turn since then. But it is still a stated policy position of the georgian government to become an EU member. They just say that they want to move towards Europe, quote, with dignity as a sovereign and independent state.

It's not an unfamiliar refrain from countries who want the benefits of being a member state without having to relinquish closely protected values, a balance currently enjoyed by Hungary and Poland. The difference, of course, is that they're already in, whereas membership is still a promise being dangled before Georgia with all the leverage that entails. Tell me, prime minister. Prime Minister, I was hoping to talk to a senior figure in georgian dream about all of this, and for a moment at the family purity day rally, I really thought I had my chance. The prime minister, Irakli Kovahidze, and some of his MP's have joined the crowd.

Kovahide has only recently been installed as PM. He's got a Beatles style mop of dark hair. It falls into his eyes. He seems surprised to hear me call out to him from the crowd. I get as close as I can.

Prime Minister, do georgian values need defending? What are you defending these values from? You are defending the values. Who are you defending them from? They really need to be defended.

Which media source are you working for? The Economist magazine?

And then the PM is gone, hustled off by his security detail as they move in a pack through. Through the crowd. I have asked for a formal interview in the time since, but his team declined. What is clear from his public statements, though, is that Kobahidze chafes at the idea that he and his country should be dictated to by the EU. The problem is that until Georgia is actually granted membership of the bloc, european diplomats can dictate the terms to some extent, and so far, the noises coming out of Brussels indicate that the foreign agents bill could be a real roadblock to membership.

This hasn't escaped the notice of Georgia's popularly elected president, Salome Zurobicvilli, an independent politician who was born in France and has deep ties to the EU. On the 18 May, the day after the family purity rally, she exercised her power, symbolic as it is, to veto the foreign influence bill.

This law, in essence and spirit, she says, is fundamentally russian, contradicting our constitution and all european standards.

Not that it matters that much. It seems certain that the parliament will in turn overrule her veto in the coming weeks, and the law could come into force as early as mid June. Already there's been mission creep. Around the same time as the president was handing down her veto, Georgians learned that new wording had been secretly added to the bill. It won't just target NGO's and media organisations, but can force individuals to give up information about their political views, their health, their sexual orientation, or else face huge fines.

To Gere, the echoes of what has happened in Russia over the past ten years or so are hard to avoid. I think we all have the same feeling.

Gia Japaridze
First we are named as foreign influence agents, then we are imprisoned like agents. It happened in Russia. This is a russian playbook.

No one invents on or tries to invent the bicycle. They have this playbook. They simply copy things from this russian playbook. That's why you call it the russian law? That's why this law is named as russian law?

Yes, because first it was adopted in Russia in 2012. What else can you do to stop it from being adopted in Georgia in 2024? The only thing that we can do is big protest demonstrations, growing protests.

Heidi Pett
But the truth of the matter is that in the absence of any meaningful political opposition in Georgia, the protests themselves aren't likely to stop georgian dream from enacting the laws and fundamentally changing the direction of the country. The war in Ukraine has shown that the promises of EU or NATO membership will not protect it against an expansionist Russia. And so Georgia is torn between its desire to be part of Europe and a need to remain on the right side of a powerful neighbour. Its government cant openly advocate for closer ties to Russia. After all, the public wants to join the EU and they remember that russian troops are stationed inside their country.

But Ivanishvili and his party can adopt a russian playbook, demonising lgbt influences and by extension, western values. Clamping down on media and civil society, changing electoral laws. Viewed through this lens, Georgia can be seen as another front in Putin's expanding war against the western order. The one hope that protesters like David and Gere have is that western governments take some kind of action before it's too late. My message is, please support us, please help us and stay with us.

Gia Japaridze
Because you see that we georgian people are fighting for our independence, for our freedom. We are fighting for democracy and for integration with the western union, the western part of the world. And you see that we all are dedicated in it and we are fighting and we know that it's our last fight, really, and we need your support. We need your help.

Tomorrow or day after tomorrow, end of May or end of June, Georgia can be a lost case. And if Georgia fails, the whole region fails. The member of german parliament said that Tbilisi is the capital of Europe. Yes, maybe the fate of Europe is decided now in Tbilisi. So it's not only Georgians fight, this is fight for Europe too.

If Georgia fails, it is a failure for EU too. That's why we need more support. Not by words but by actions. Sanction their finances. Put travel bans on the members of their families.

Put travel bans and financial sanctions on these 85 or 83 members of Georgia parliament who voted in favor of the russian law. Members of georgian government, inner circle of Ivanishvili members of his family. He personally tomorrow will be too late.

Heidi Pett
With the bill almost certain to pass into law, Guia is no longer sure what kind of country he'll wake up in. For sure. I know that I will be in Georgia, but I don't know. I will be in prison or I'll be a free citizen of this country. And I don't know if this country will be free and independent.

Gia Japaridze
It's a difficult question. It seems to be an ordinary question, but with the current situation in Georgia, it's almost philosophical question.

Jason Palmer
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Thanks for listening. This episode of the Weekend Intelligence was reported by Heidi Pett and produced by Pete Naughton. Special thanks to Akha Zarkawa. The executive producer of the weekend intelligence is Gemma Newby. We'll see you back here on Monday.

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