Parliament official says Gov’t “open to suggestions” from European partners to make transparency law compatible with EU directives
The Parliament on Tuesday adopted the bill reintroduced by the ruling Georgian Dream party on the backdrop of ongoing public protests. Photo: Parliament of Georgia
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Nikoloz Samkharadze, the Chair of the Foreign Relations Committee of the Georgian Parliament, on Thursday said the Georgian Government was “open to suggestions” from its European partners on changes to the newly adopted law on transparency of foreign influence to make it compatible with European Union directives.
In his interview with the British Broadcasting Corporation, Samkharadze claimed there were “no similarities” between the Georgian law and the “foreign agents” legislation in Russia, as claimed by the domestic opposition, non-governmental sector and the country’s Western partners.
On the contrary, the Russian law has strict rules on applying criminal liability to individual persons on closing and shutting down non-governmental organisations, [and] prohibiting people from taking part in the elections. The Georgian law only has one requirement for NGOs that are funded from abroad - to declare their assets and expenditures. That's it. No other requirement”, he said.
“We are open also to suggestions from European partners on what needs to be changed in the current law that would make this law compatible, for example, with European Union directives”, he noted.
The Parliament on Tuesday adopted the bill reintroduced by the ruling Georgian Dream party on the backdrop of ongoing public protests.
The legislative piece, which 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, was supported by 84 MPs in the 150-member lawmaking body, with 30 voting against.
It requires groups “considered to be an organisation pursuing the interests of a foreign power” to be registered in the public registry with the status and publicise their received funding.
President Salome Zourabichvili on Sunday said she would veto the legislative piece, however the ruling party has enough votes to override her veto in the Parliament.