Russia’s war on Ukraine ‘a consequence of Maidan’ claims Georgia’s ruling party head
Irakli Kobakhidze (Photo:www.facebook.com/KobakhidzeOfficial)
With protests raging in Tbilisi, the head of Georgia’s ruling party, Irakli Kobakhidze, seemed to justify Russia’s war on Ukraine by saying it was a “consequence of the Maidan”, RFE/RL branch Echo of the Caucasus reported on March 7.
“What about the Maidan and what did it help Ukraine achieve?”, he asked. “They lost Crimea and most of Luhansk and Donetsk, the continuation of all this is the war that goes on in Ukraine today.”
The Maidan protests of 2013-2014 were prompted by government violence against pro-European Union protestors. They escalated into a popular revolt against the pro-Russian Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych, who fled the country after his security forces massacred more than 100 people in the center of Kyiv in late February 2014.
Kobakhidze’a comments came after MEP Viola von Cramon remarked that the dispersal of the protests in Tbilisi reminder her of Ukraine’s Maidan Revolution in 2013-14.
“Georgia’s Yanukovych is in prison, and his name is Mikheil Saakashvili,” Kobakhidze quipped.
“We will not act according to the agenda of the radicals, the agenda of Viola von Cramon, but in accordance with the interests of Georgian society,” he said.
Kobakhidze stated that the ruling Georgian Dream political party “carries the truth for the benefit of society.” He blamed the “radical” opposition for misleading observers to the intent of Georgia’s law on foreign influence in the parliament.
He called statements that the adoption of the law on foreign agents will negatively affect Georgia’s EU bid “speculations.”
“I repeat, once again, the campaign related to the connection of this draft law with the status of a candidate is of a speculative nature,” he said.
On March 7, the Georgian parliament supported the draft law on foreign agents in the first reading, a copycat law of one previously adopted in the Russian Federation.
The law, backed by Kobakhidze’s Georgian Dream party, requires any organization that receives more than 20 percent of their funding from abroad to register as “foreign agents”, or face fines.
The country’s president, Salome Zurabishvili, has said she will veto the bill, but the parliamentary majority has enough votes to override a presidential veto.
Mass protests are ongoing in Tbilisi. The police have used tear gas and water cannons to disperse the demonstrators.
Zurabishvili continues to support the protesters.
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