Teenagers, parents, footballers, politicians and even the president have taken to the streets of Tbilisi, Georgia every night to express their objection to the October parliamentary elections and the Georgian government’s recent announcement it was suspending the country’s European Union accession. Old folks are out there too.
In one video, young men kindly surround a “babushka” to prevent her from getting pummeled by water cannons. Black-clad “robo cops” without any identifying insignia are brutally attacking peaceful protesters, kicking their heads in when they are already on the ground and unconscious.
These security forces have a particular appetite for journalists, such that several of my friends are in the hospital with broken noses and concussions.
I moved to Georgia in 2014, at a time when democracy was having a moment. There had been a peaceful transfer of power from Mikheil Saakashvili’s regime to the Georgian Dream coalition. Democratic reforms were being implemented. The country established a ministry dedicated to integration into the EU and NATO. It was a safe haven for democratic activists from autocratic regimes.
Now it has itself become an autocracy.
Democracy was always Georgia’s primary asset. The West’s relationship with the country was forged on shared values, not oil or trade. Without democracy, Georgia’s partnership is of limited value. It is time for the U.S. and EU to dispense with the “concerned” embassy statements and lay down some consequences.
The first whiffs of democratic decline came not too long after I moved there. It started as it often does with illiberal measures, fueled by robust Kremlin information operations, targeting those in the country who are gay, transgender or ethnic minorities. The Georgia Dream coalition soon fell apart, with the more reform-minded parties leaving.
Key judicial reforms failed to pass, and attacks on media increased. A pivotal sign of decline was when the Georgia Dream party allowed Sergei Gavrilov, a member of Russia’s parliament, to speak from the podium in Georgia’s parliament. Protests erupted, followed by a violent police response.
Rather than unify Georgians around their Western allies and shared democratic values, the full-scale invasion of Ukraine led to Georgia Dream leaders insulting American and European diplomats, lawmakers, and officials, labeling them the “global war party” and accusing them of pushing Georgia into a “second front” with Russia.
Georgia has since become a sanctions-evasion route for Russia, including for repurposed machinery supporting the war, and Georgia Dream has resumed flights to and from Moscow. The Georgian people, however, took to the streets to support their brothers and sisters in Ukraine, and Ukrainian flags hang from apartments across the capital.
In addition to cozying up to Moscow, Georgia Dream has forged new partnerships with China, Iran and other autocratic regimes.
This year, the government turned its focus on the strongest democratic element in Georgia — civil society — and passed a Russia-modeled “foreign agents law” to restrict their activities. In addition, Georgia Dream passed an anti-gay “propaganda” law that restricts free assembly and speech and an “offshore assets” law to enable the country’s de facto leader oligarch Bidzina Ivanishvili to more opaquely move his wealth. To tilt the electoral playing field, the party refused to follow the law on appointing the head of the election commission — installing a loyalist instead — and ignored required EU electoral reforms.
Before the polls opened on Oct. 26, the integrity of the elections was already in doubt. The campaign period was riddled with intimidation, vote buying, and raids of and legal threats against civil society and election monitoring organizations. Georgia Dream and the Kremlin — in lockstep — scared voters with threats of war if they voted for the opposition. And Georgia Dream campaigned on the promise to have Nuremberg trials for its critics and ban all opposition parties.
I’ve observed elections around the world for decades, and many elections in Georgia, and election day was filled with serious irregularities — multiple voting, ballot stuffing, lack of secrecy, intimidation and statistical impossibilities (like 107 percent of men voting in certain districts). The results also did not match the findings of reputable international exit polls, which showed an opposition victory. While we will never know exactly how much of the result was affected by the violations, we can say with certainty that the elections failed to meet democratic standards.
Georgia Dream officially sat parliament last week. This was an illegal act, as there are election cases pending in the constitutional court and the president is required to approve (she refused). One of Georgia Dream’s first actions was to abort plans to join the EU, despite overwhelming public support for EU membership.
These leaders have made their intentions crystal clear. They have flipped the script as to who are the country’s friends and foes. The U.S. must respond accordingly and defend the Georgian people by not recognizing the election results (and illegal parliament) and demanding an independent (not Georgian) investigation of electoral complaints. Financial sanctions and travel bans should be enacted against Ivanishvili, his affiliates, and Georgia Dream leaders as well as the security forces attacking citizens. The U.S. should call upon Georgian officials, diplomats and police to follow the constitution and refuse Georgia Dream’s orders. The EU has significant leverage and should use it, namely by ending visa free travel for Georgia Dream’s leadership.
While we must isolate Georgia Dream, we cannot abandon the Georgian people. U.S. and EU support for civil society and independent media should be increased. And we must continue to stand in solidarity with peaceful protestors. After all, they’ve been successful before — in 2003, the people’s Rose Revolution restored democracy and threw off the shackles of a corrupt regime.
Laura Thornton lived 25 years overseas working for democracy-promotion organizations from Thailand and Cambodia to Georgia. She is senior director for global democracy at the McCain Institute.
