Georgian Parliament Speaker urges all donors to refrain from funding those who violate human rights

Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili on Saturday urged all international donors in the country to “proactively ensure” that their funds align with shared values in human rights and to avoid support for projects and individuals fostering societal radicalisation amid the absence of legislation on foreign funding transparency.

In a press conference following a controversy around the image featuring Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin on an icon of Russian Saint Matrona, donated to the Tbilisi Holy Trinity Cathedral by members of a political party and around the date Georgia celebrates Christmas, Papuashvili said the radical opposition was involved in “the coordinated assault” on the Orthodox Church by civil activists and media.

For the first time in the history of independent Georgia, we witnessed the desecration of an icon in the church. The first time, after the collapse of the Soviet empire, the Orthodox congregation became an object of harassment because of the celebration of Christmas”, Papuashvili noted.

• Parliament Speaker slams opposition’s “coordinated attacks on Orthodox Church” as attempts to “demean values”, harm country, Gov’t

He condemned the participation of Beka Mindiashvili, the Head of the Tolerance Centre, which allegedly operates under the Public Defender, in “orchestrating a campaign attacking on religious grounds instead of promoting religious tolerance”.

Papuashvili said the Public Defender Levan Ioseliani had revealed that the Tolerance Centre was not a structural unit of his office. The Parliament Speaker criticised the misappropriation of the name of the constitutional body - Public Defender by the Centre and added that it “misleads the citizens and presents the non-governmental organisation as a state institution”.

He further explained that the Tolerance Centre was a separate project funded by the United States Agency for International Development, and called on the USAID to “clarify the matter and act in the best interest of both American and Georgian people”.

The Parliament Speaker also expressed concern over the fact that Giorgi Kandelaki, the representative of the NGO Soviet Past Research Laboratory and a member of the opposition European Georgia party, was “igniting hysteria” related to the icon in the Trinity Cathedral.