1.1: Russia-Georgia relations

The 2008 war

Relations between Georgia and Russia are characterised by tensions between the two countries, which have regularly erupted into violence. The 2008 Russia-Georgia war, which lasted 12 days, is the most prominent example. A priority spelt out by then-president Mikhail Saakashvili after his election in 2004, was to try and bring back the renegade regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia under Georgian authority. After Saakashvili quickly established authority in Adjara, he shifted attention towards both separatist regions. This increased tensions with Russia, which has spoken out against Georgian NATO and EU accession. These tensions were already present with the pro-Western change of power in Georgia as part of the 2003 Rose Revolution. In August 2008, tensions between Russia and Georgia started escalating. An incident of a Russian spy plane shot down over Georgian territory resulted in a brief full-scale war. At the end of this war in which Russia was an aggressor, Kremlin-supported puppet regimes claimed territorial control over parts of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, and were consequently recognised by the Kremlin. However, according to international law, both regions remain part of Georgian sovereign territory.

The initial international response gravely condemned Russia for its actions and demanded withdrawal from Georgia. Specifically, the US started lobbying intensively for a sped-up Georgian accession to the NATO; something which European countries were somewhat divided about, despite equally condemning Russia. As time went by and investigations were launched, however, more and more reprimands started to appear towards the Georgian side as well as the Russian side. In October/November 2008 an independent international investigation group was created to look into the August events, headed by Heidi Tagliavini, a Swiss diplomat who served as UN Secretary General’s special representative to Georgia from 2002 to 2006. The report eventually put the blame on both sides.

The war’s aftermath

After the war, both Georgia and Russia attempted to normalise relationships between both countries. A Georgian-Russian deal allowed Russia to proceed with its World Trade Organization application. In 2012, Georgia introduced visa-free entrance for Russian passport holders. From the Russian side, a 7-year embargo on Georgian wine, one of the countries primary export products, was lifted in 2013. In October 2014, Russia eased visa procedures for Georgian citizens. However, the normalisation of relations between both countries failed to bring an end to the dispute over the breakaway regions, and support among the Georgian population for dialogue with Russia depleted over time.

Effects of the Ukraine War

The Russian invasion of Ukraine has raised concerns in Georgia. The war raises the question of whether Russia will further neglect Georgia’s territorial integrity. It resulted in calls to retake South Ossetia and Abkhazia and in Georgia’s accelerated application for EU membership, the process for which it had already begun before the war. However, it also led to a dramatic expansion of the far-right and anti-western group called Alt-info, which also launched a political party.

After Putin announced a partial mobilisation of military reserves in September 2022, long queues formed at the Georgian border. As one of the few neighbouring countries to which Russians can travel visa-free, Georgia has already hosted thousands of Russians fleeing conscription.

Georgia has condemned Russia’s incursion into Ukraine and continues to support Kyiv politically and diplomatically. However, Georgia has not participated in applying sanctions against Russia. As a result, Georgia is not on the Kremlin’s list of unfriendly countries. Many consider Georgia’s condemnation of Russia as ingenuine. Notably, Georgia’s president Salome Zourabichvili, who often clashes with GD, was taken to court by GD due to her outspoken support for Ukraine. Furthermore, Georgia-Russia trade ties have expanded amid the Ukraine War. Journalists and activists who are critical of Russia are also increasingly denied entry into Georgia. Another important symbolic move took place in May 2023, when Russia abolished visas for Georgians and lifted a ban on direct flights between Russia and Georgia, leading to protests.

1.2: Democratic backsliding

Areas of concern

Since 2012, the Georgian Dream (GD) coalition is in power with, currently, a constitutional majority in parliament. According to Freedom House, “Georgia holds regular and competitive elections. Its democratic trajectory showed signs of improvement during the period surrounding a change in government in 2012–13, but recent years have featured backsliding. Oligarchic influence affects the country’s political affairs, policy decisions, and media environment, and the rule of law is undermined by politicization. Civil liberties are inconsistently protected.” Areas of concern include media freedom, with an unprecedented number of physical assaults on journalists in 2021. Moreover, there is still a lack of accountability for abuse among law enforcement. Georgia also has a disproportionately strict drug policy and a long history of discrimination against the LGBTI community. In 2021, Human Rights Watch also reported a setback for Georgia. The NGO mentioned crimes committed by law enforcement agents, police violence, the lack of freedom of assembly, attacks on journalists, threats to media pluralism, unsafe working conditions, and a lack of justice reforms. In 2023, concerns further grew when GD proposed foreign agent laws which would have cracked down critical watchdogs and NGOs. The law was later withdrawn.

Opposition parties

Opposition forces are structurally undermined by GD, for instance through attacks and arrests. Notably, opposition party United National Movement (UNM) has claimed that its prominent members are subjected to politically motivated investigations and trials, with its founder Mikhail Saakashvili unable to formally lead the party having lost his Georgian citizenship in 2015, after gaining the Ukrainian citizenship, and unable to return to Georgia as he is wanted by Georgian authorities. In a similar manner, in February of 2021, the UNM’s leader Nika Melia was convicted of organizing “mass violence” during a 2019 opposition protest. The party claims the following arrest was purely politically motivated. Even though Melia was granted amnesty for the 2019 protests, the struggle between the UNM and GD continues.

Bidzina Ivanshvili

There are also some concerns surrounding the role of GD founder and former Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili: there are allegations that he still wields quite some power behind the scenes while not having any formal (political) position. Ivanishvili’s wealth has given him a distinct position of power in Georgian politics – his personal wealth is the same as one-third of Georgia’s GDP. Informal actors having a big influence on political choices continues to be a challenge for Georgia. Additionally, critics say the judicial branch does not work independently from the government and the parliament, whose interests often affect the judges’ decisions. For these reasons, Georgia has often been criticised for being an oligarchy.

1.3: Georgia’s EU bid

Developments after March 2022

Georgia has aspired EU candidacy status since the Russian invasion of its northern provinces Abkhazia and Northern Ossetia. Its pathway to become candidate in 2024 has been accelerated due to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, subsequently handing in its EU bids alongside Moldova and Ukraine in March 2022. In June 2022, Ukraine and Moldova acquired a positive EU endorsement, while Georgia remained empty-handed. The commission said that Georgia still has to fulfil key conditions on political polarisation, media freedom, judicial reform, and “de-oligarchisation”, before granting a positive recommendation towards EU candidacy. This led to several pro-EU and anti-government rallies.

“De-oligarchisation”

The “de-oligarchization” of Georgian society will be presumably be the key condition for Georgia to acquire EU candidacy. The current government, led by the Georgian Dream party is under major influence of oligarch Bidzina Ivanishvili – whose capital equivalates one-third of Georgia’s GDP. Earlier in June, the European Parliament passed a nonbinding resolution that called for sanctions on Ivanishvili for his “destructive role” in Georgian politics. Furthermore, the Georgian Dream-led administration has cracked down on media freedom, civil society and judicial independence. This all has been a major shake-up of Georgia being a frontrunning candidate for EU aspirations in Eastern Europe. The deferral of the European Commission led tens of thousands of Georgians to rally on June 20 in the capital Tbilisi.

Recent developments

The recent pro-Russian, repressive, and conservative acts of the Georgian government make the path to EU-membership more difficult and have delinked Georgia from Moldova and Ukraine. Some even question whether the government is truly keen on establishing closer EU ties. The government needs to significantly improve in terms of de-oligarchisation, anti-corruption, public finances, and judicial reforms. The European Commission will reassess the country’s progress in October 2023. Further significant consolidation of authoritarian power in Georgia may severely hinder its EU integration.

1.4: National minorities in Georgia

Georgia is a multilingual and multi-ethnic country. National minorities enjoy full (political) rights under the constitution and make up of 13%  of Georgia’s population according to a 2014 census. The two largest national minority groups in the country are the Azeri (6%) and the Armenians (5%). Although Azeri and Armenians minority groups hold Georgian passports, they often consider themselves to be citizens of Azerbaijan and Armenia. Besides these groups, a variety of smaller groups live within the state borders. Nonetheless, studies commissioned by Carnegie in September 2020 that minorities showed that they consider themselves to be loyal towards the Georgian state. Only 16% considered their ethnicity more important than their Georgian citizenship. Because minorities do not always speak Georgian, their level of political participation is relatively low. Language barriers between speakers of Georgian and minority languages are considered to reinforce alienation of ethnic minorities. However, especially in the run-up to the latest presidential election, more information in Armenian, Azeri, Ossetian and Russian was provided.

There are no ethnic political parties, although several parties have included members of national minorities in lists and as majoritarian candidates, nominating them in districts where minorities form a substantial part of the population. To enhance integration of minorities in Georgia, the government established the Civil Integration and Tolerance Council. To further improve the  integration of ethnic minorities in civic-nation building in Georgia, practical steps need to be taken to create a strategy which oversees equal and complete involvement of minorities in Georgian politics and society.

1.5: Gender participation and women’s rights

While there are no legal obstacles for women, Georgian politics remain dominated by men. Previously, Nino Burjanadze was the woman to hold the highest political function, but she left the then-ruling UNM shortly before the parliamentary elections of 2008. However, in recent years there have been some improvements regards to gender inclusion in Georgian politics. Salome Zourabichvili was elected as Georgia’s first female President in December 2018. In 2020, there have also been several electoral changes that guarantee participation of women in politics. Political parties require at least a quarter of their elected representatives to be female. This had led to at least 30 women out of a total of 150 MPs being elected.

On a local level, politics remains more male-dominated. A career in politics is often seen as something ‘unfeminine’ in Georgian society, mainly because the political scene is often described as “rough-edged” and influenced by a “machoculture”. Moreover, many women quit university when they marry or get pregnant and exchange their education for the family. Georgia has made much progress when it comes to adopting anti-discrimination legislation. However, gender stereotypes remain deeply rooted and a significant gap continues to exist with regards to economic participation and opportunities.

1.6: LGBTI rights

As Georgia became more influenced by highly traditional Orthodox Christian values after the fall of communism, public opinion towards LGBTI people remains negative. Georgia’s LGBTI community faces discrimination and challenges that non-LGBTI people do not have to face. Abuse and physical violence towards LGBTI people remains common as well, although discrimination against LGBTI people is prohibited by law. Same-sex marriage remains prohibited, and was even constitutionally banned in 2018. In 2023, the government submitted a ‘queer propaganda’ bill to the Parliament, which was meant to seriously demonise LGBTQ-people

Prominent examples of structural violence against the LGBTQI-community in Georgia include the frequent attacks and disruptions that take place at Tbilisi Pride. For instance, in 2021, attacks and threats led to the cancellation of the Pride march. On the 8th of July 2023, the Pride festival in Tbilisi was stormed by up to 5,000 members of violent far-right and pro-Russian groups, which led to its cancellation. The ‘protesters’ included Orthodox Christian clergy and waved Georgian flags while carrying religious icons. After marching toward the site of the event, they vandalised the stage, burned rainbow flags, set fires, looted the event’s bar, and played traditional Georgian folk music.

Organisers of Tbilisi Pride believe that the disruption was preplanned and coordinated between the government and radical groups. They believe the Ministry of Internal Affairs to have collaborated with a violent, conservative group called ‘Alt-Info’, a group which has also organised a demonstration in 2022, protesting against both the gay parade and European integration. Georgia’s European integration and initiatives that rally for proper LGBTQIA+ rights seem closely connected in the minds of conservative, far-right groups. However, freedom of assembly and speech for all are key aspects of any democratic society, and this is not merely related to the European Union’s values.

Interior Minister Alexander Darakhvelidze and chairman of Georgia’s parliament Shalva Papuashvili, both members of the ruling Georgian Dream party, defended the conduct of the police. Papuashvili stated that “the police had an appropriate response” and “properly ensured the safety of both participants and journalists.”

What is highly concerning is not only the tragic violence at the Georgia Pride event, but also the way in which government authorities have fuelled this, both allegedly, by cooperating with far-right groups and indirectly, by spreading anti-LGBTQIA+ sentiments. For example, in a speech at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili spoke about forces who are “destructing the traditional family values and coercing false freedoms through LGBTQIA+ propaganda and attempts to legislate gender-affirming procedures for children”, stating that he wants to protect “the rights of the majority, for whom the family is a union between a man and a woman; where a woman is a mother, and a man is a father.” and proudly stating: “We protect the rights of the vast majority of the population, who supported my initiative in 2014, upon which our political party later included in the Constitution the definition of the marriage as the union between a man and a woman.”