(CN) — Georgia, the small former Soviet republic in the South Caucus, was racked by another night of mass protests on Friday fueled by anger over the government's drift toward what many fear is a Russian-style autocracy.
In Tbilisi, the capital, tensions are boiling over after the Georgia parliament this week moved a step closer to passing a controversial “foreign influence” law requiring nongovernmental organizations and media outlets that receive more than 20% of their funding to register as foreign agents.
The bill, which mimics a Russian law passed in 2012, is seen as an attack on Western-funded civil society groups and pro-democracy efforts. European Union leaders and Washington angrily denounced the proposed law and warned its passage jeopardizes Georgia's entry into the Western alliance.
“Unfortunately, the ruling party appears determined to advance legislation that the EU has clearly said is incompatible with Georgia’s EU aspirations,” warned U.S. Ambassador Robin L. Dunnigan. “We urge the Georgian government to recommit the country to its Euro-Atlantic future, as written in Georgia’s constitution.”
Georgia is a highly volatile spot on the geopolitical map of Europe and the Middle East because it is on the path toward both EU and NATO membership but it also lies within Russia's sphere of influence, maintains close ties with Moscow and fears Russian aggression.
The majority of Georgia's 3.7 million people, who are predominantly Orthodox Christian, see their future as part of the EU and NATO, but Russia has sought to block this trajectory for political, economic and military reasons. Resolving this tension lies at the heart of Georgian politics. Ominously, the threat of war with Russia hangs over a country where about 20% of its territory is occupied by Russian troops.
Last December, the EU moved to give Georgia “candidate status,” an important step in the long process to become a member of the EU club. To join, candidate countries must adopt a series of judicial, political and economic measures designed to make them liberal democracies.
But Georgia's government, led by an oligarch-run party known as Georgian Dream, argues its foreign agent law is needed to shine a light on groups seeking to destabilize the country. It also argues that many countries, including the United States, have similar laws to identify foreign actors.
Many Georgians, though, aren't buying this argument.
On Thursday, tens of thousands of people took to the streets in what was described Georgia's biggest protest in years. They blocked key thoroughfares, danced and chanted on Heroes Square in central Tbilisi and descended on parliament. It was at the parliament building where chaotic and sometimes violent scenes unfolded. Several protesters and police officers were injured in the clashes.
The protests continued on Friday and they were expected to intensify for at least two more weeks because the government has vowed to not back down from passing the legislation in a final reading in parliament on May 17.
With parliamentary elections slated for October, the tensions may only worsen in the coming months.
Critics say the foreign agent law was inspired by similar legislation passed in 2012 by Russian President Vladimir Putin which became a tool of repression against civil society groups and media outlets in Russia critical of the government.
Since 2012, Georgian Dream has won three elections in a row. But political analysts say the party has morphed from being a center-left, pro-European and reform-minded party to an anti-Western force that has more in common with far-right, anti-EU and illiberal politicians like Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán.
“The ruling party, Georgian Dream, is turning into a nightmare day by day,” said Natalie Sabanadze, a former Georgian diplomat under Georgian Dream and expert at Chatham House, a British think tank, in a recent interview.
She said Georgians are protesting out of fear for their country's future.
“The choice is clear: Either live in a Russia-style autocracy,” she said, “or live in a European-style democracy.”
She said opposing the passage of the foreign agent law is crucial.
“These kinds of laws are instruments in the hands of increasingly autocratic governments,” she said. “Georgia at the moment is still a kind of hybrid regime; but I think if it goes through with this law, it is on the way to becoming fully authoritarian.”
In power, Georgian Dream has sought to maintain close ties with both the West and Russia, a balancing act that it kept up even after Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
After the Ukraine war broke out, Tbilisi refused to go along with Western sanctions against Russia and Georgian Dream leaders have increasingly accused Western powers of seeking to drag Georgia into the war by opening a second front against Russia.
But opposition to Georgian Dream may be growing as many in the country, especially urban elites and younger people, worry the ruling party is deliberately sabotaging Georgia's candidacy for EU membership. For the protesters, the foreign agents law is clear evidence the ruling party wants to antagonize the West and lead Georgia down the path of Putin's Russia.
Protesters accuse Georgian Dream politicians — and in particular the party's de facto leader, a Georgian oligarch called Bidzina Ivanishvili who inspires suspicions because he made a fortune in the 1990s in business deals in Russia — of working on behalf of Moscow, seeking to consolidate their rule and enriching themselves.
In response to the Western criticism of the law and police violence against protesters, Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze accused Western actors of seeking to foment an uprising to overthrow the government.
All of this is reminiscent of the momentous events in 2014 that led to the overthrow of Ukraine's president, Viktor Yanukovych, in the Maidan protests that broke out after he withdrew support for an economic agreement with the EU. The Maidan protests led to Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea and the outbreak of war in eastern Ukraine.
In many ways, though, the escalating conflict between Russia and the West, which exploded with Putin's invasion of Ukraine, has roots that go back to Georgia.
In 2008, shortly after then-U.S. President George W. Bush said Georgia and Ukraine should be included in NATO, Russia sent troops into the breakaway Georgian republics of South Ossetia and Abkhazia when war broke out there between pro-Russian separatists and Georgia's anti-Russian government.
Courthouse News reporter Cain Burdeau is based in the European Union.
Follow @cainburdeau
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