“It is very similar to the Maidan in Kyiv.” The words are from a comment by the Foreign Minister of Russia Sergei Lavrov from his interview for Channel One.
“The recent events in Georgia are very similar to the Kyiv Maidan, as the situation surrounding the draft law on foreign agents was only a pretext for launching an attempt to forcefully change the government“, are Lavrov’s exact words.
The law that caused several days of mass protests in major cities and serious tension between citizens and rulersprovides for a special order of registration of those NGOs, which receive foreign funding in the amount of 20% of their budget – legislation already adopted and implemented in the Russian Federation. This morning, Georgia’s parliament scrapped plans to introduce a “foreign agents” law it had sparked a major domestic political crisisafter the ruling Georgian Dream party withdrew its support for the bill.
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However, instead of commenting on this comparison, as well as possibly commenting on the application of legislation on foreign agents in Russia, Sergey Lavrov compares it with regulations in Western countries and specifically states USA, France, India and Israel. according to him the Georgian project “fades” compared to how non-profit organizations are regulated in these countries. Lavrov states that in the USA such a violation will lead to a fine of 250,000 dollars and 5 years in prison, and in Georgia the foreseen fine is much smaller – 9 thousand dollars and is passed without criminal proceedings.
The Russian Foreign Minister attack and statement by Josep Borrell, calling it hypocritical, as many European countries had similar and stricter legislation. However, Lavrov does not specify such countries.
“Yet, despite the fact that a number of European countries have the same norms, much stricter norms on the same subject… Mr. Borrell without batting an eyesaid the law, which Georgians are pushing through the ruling Georgian Dream party, contradicts European values and stands in the way of the accession of Georgia to the European Union. In general, the hypocrisy is, of course, obvious,” commented Lavrov.
Georgia is applying for EU membership last March, but did not receive candidate status and will first have to implement some reforms – including strengthening the independence of its judiciary.
