Parliament Speaker denounces President for “referring to police with Russian terminology”

Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili on Thursday claimed President Salome Zourabichvili had “crossed all red lines” by “using Russian terminology to refer to the police”.

Papuashvili’s comments followed after Zourabichvili on Monday used the Russian term “spetsnaz” [riot police] in a social media message to refer to law enforcement present at a public protest against the bill on the transparency of foreign influence outside the Parliament in Tbilisi.

Salome Zourabichvili used Russian terminology to refer to the police and thus crossed all red lines regarding the state. Something unbelievable happened yesterday when she complained about her own Government to the Government of a foreign country”, Papuashvili said in reference to Zourabichvili’s appeal to the French President to consider the recent developments in the country.

The chief Georgian legislator further claimed Zourabichvili’s recent actions were “showing her failure to understand the concept of state sovereignty”.

Domestic opposition parties, non-governmental organisations, media outlets and citizens on Wednesday gathered outside the Parliament to protest the controversial bill that calls for the registration of non-commercial legal entities and media outlets in the country as “pursuing the interests of a foreign power” if they derive more than 20 percent of their funding from abroad..

The legislative body approved the first reading of the draft law on Wednesday, with further hearings to follow before its potential adoption.