Parliament Speaker: bill on transparency of foreign influence “will not affect” country’s European integration

Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili on Wednesday said  the controversial bill on the transparency of foreign influence, reintroduced by the Parliamentary majority in the lawmaking body, would not affect the country’s European integration process.

Papuashvili’s comments followed a decision of the ruling party to resubmit the bill - 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“pursuing the interests of a foreign power” if they derive more than 20 percent of their funding from abroad - after it was retracted last year following the public protests.

In an interview with Imedi TV, Papuashvili said “transparency is Europe, while lack of transparency is the Soviet Union”, in comments justifying the draft law.

In fact, those screaming [against this bill] are defending the Soviet Union in our system, not Europe, since Europe is about transparency. That's why they adopt this directive for transparency in the European Union”, he said in reference to the European Commission’s Defence of Democracy package.

“In today's world, where hybrid methods are one of the methods of influence, every state tries to protect its citizens from the hidden influence of soft power”, Papuashvili said.

The Speaker further told the channel Georgia “should not be a kind of corridor where anyone can come in and spend money to spread their influence and interests, and then leave without the public even knowing what happened”.

“Geopolitically, Georgia is in one of the difficult regions. In fact, there is an arc of fire around us. There are political, economic and, in some cases, business interests in various sectors towards our country”, he concluded.

The Georgian Parliament last year formally retracted the draft law following the decision by the ruling Georgian Dream party to withdraw the bill, after Georgian-based non-governmental organisations, the United States Department of State, European Union officials and the United Nations Office in Georgia all spoke out in criticism of the bill.