Parliament Speaker denounces domestic opposition’s “campaign” to brand bill on transparency of foreign influence as “Russian law”

Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili on Friday claimed domestic non-governmental organisations and the opposition United National Movement party had “once again started a campaign” to brand the bill on transparency of foreign influence as a “Russian law”.

The comments followed a decision of the ruling party to resubmit the bill that calls for 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 bill’s original proposal last year was followed by public protests that saw NGOs, parties and a part of the public refer to it with the title in reference to a similar piece of legislation in Russia. The draft law was subsequently retracted by the ruling party and the Parliament.

In his remarks, Papuashvili alleged the “campaign” against the reactivated bill was “funded with foreign money”.

You may have seen the banners on social media, which amount to direct disinformation and lies, and which are funded with foreign money today. This campaign is underway with foreign money, [and] disinformation is being disseminated against citizens that are funded with American, European, Swedish, Dutch money, using the resources of these NGOs”, Papuashvili said.

“Therefore, I urge all embassies and donors to pay attention to this issue, because whatever lies these NGOs told last year in order to hide their finances, today, these lies are being repeated with foreign funding”, he concluded.

The Parliament Speaker on Wednesday said the principle of the bill initiated by the parliamentary majority was “simple” and consisted of the idea that “the public deserves to know who wields influence over their lives”.

The reintroduction of the bill has been criticised by officials from the European Commission, NATO, Council of Europe and US Department of State.