Manana Kochladze is chairwoman of Green Alternative, an environmental organization in Georgia, and a strategic area leader in democratization and human rights at the Bankwatch Network. Mariam Patsatsia is a community support coordinator at Green Alternative and Bankwatch.
Endorsed by the ruling Georgian Dream party, a bill similar to Russia’s law on “foreign agents” is currently being rushed through Georgia’s parliament.
If the bill becomes law, it will compel nonprofits and media outlets that receive at least 20 percent of their funding from abroad to register as “agents of foreign influence.” And refusing registration, or not complying with the burdensome reporting requirements, will lead to considerable fines.
To make matters worse, in an even more dystopian twist, members of the ruling parliamentary majority — the sponsors of the bill — have now introduced a second version of this draft law as well, and it makes the original seem soft by comparison. The revised legislation expands targets to include individuals and other associations, while also making provisions for a prison sentence of up to five years, in addition to fines.
The clear aim here is to stifle dissent, and to further restrict civil space in Georgia by labeling and stigmatizing independent media and civil society groups. Crucially, it is a move that also risks derailing Georgia’s European Union aspirations.
So far this week, the initial bill on “transparency of foreign influence” was hastily adopted on Tuesday, in the first of three hearings needed for the law to take effect. The proceedings took place against a backdrop of angry chants as people protested outside. For two nights in a row, the police have used water cannons and tear gas to disperse the peaceful protests.
Georgian Dream has already warned that one of these bills will pass all three hearings and be adopted into a law. And if this happens, Georgia’s democratic backsliding — a consequence of the ruling party’s step-by-step capture of the state’s independent institutions for the advantage of its founder billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili — will continue to proceed unchecked.
But by backing draft laws that go against the fundamental values of democracy, the ruling party is also challenging the country’s EU accession process.
Georgia was told it will receive EU membership candidate status this year, if it makes sufficient progress on the 12 reform priorities outlined by the European Commission. The two bills stand in direct opposition to the required reforms on media freedom and civil society involvement, while also doing nothing to address the first priority — decreasing polarization. And, as legal experts point out, the proposed legislation even violates several EU laws, as well as the European Convention on Human Rights.
The bills must, therefore, be resisted at all costs — both in Georgia and abroad, and now rather than later.
And Georgia’s partners, the EU above all, should also consider taking appropriate countermeasures, including travel bans and sanctions on those .
Currently, over 400 civil and community-based organizations and over 60 independent media outlets, , are protesting the proposed laws. Meanwhile, the United Nations in Georgia has warned that “if adopted, such a law is likely to impede the[ir] work” as well.
This is because in Georgia, the label of “foreign agent” is tantamount to “traitor” or “foreign spy,” and it is intended to undermine the public’s trust in civil society. This would imperil the efforts of many organizations to provide mental health and social services — many of which the state is unwilling or unable to offer — to children, women, the elderly, individuals with disabilities and survivors of domestic violence and abuse. And as an environmental organization ourselves, such a designation would jeopardize our ability to reach out to locals and support their fight for environmental and social justice, the single most important goal of our work.
While the legislation has not yet passed, Georgian Dream Chair Irakli Kobakhidze, one of its most zealous advocates, has already weaponized the proposed laws in a smear campaign against several civil society organizations and environmental defenders. These are groups working on disparate issues, from corruption to women’s rights, and the organizers and supporters of the biggest environmental protest in decades, which saw diverse groups rally against the harmful environmental impacts of a proposed dam in 2021.
Many human rights defenders, activists and journalists that were persecuted by governments in Russia, Belarus, Azerbaijan and elsewhere have also found a new home in Georgia and continue their work in exile. These bills threaten their future as well.
Yet, the sole argument touted by the bills’ supporters — the apparent need for increased transparency on foreign-funded nonprofits and media — has proven unfounded. Even by the admission of the chair of the Georgian Dream faction in parliament, information on civil society’s donors and finances is already available to the public and to the government.
Thus, under this guise of transparency what the bill will really do is assist the government in its war of attrition against civil society and independent media, burying them in petty and pointless paperwork to the detriment of their important work.
Such was the case in Russia in 2012, when President Vladimir Putin signed the law on foreign agents, with the aim of cracking down on free expression and civic activism. Many authoritarian leaders in our region, including in Belarus and neighboring Azerbaijan, have since followed suit and copied Putin’s repressive playbook to quell dissent. This cannot happen in Georgia as well.
The EU needs to take decisive action by supporting the Georgian people in their efforts to join the European family. And as a matter of urgency, it should call on the country’s political leaders not to go against the constitutional commitments, which oblige them to ensure Georgia’s full integration into the EU.
