European officials’ participation in protest rally “negatively affects” image of their countries, EU - PM

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze on Thursday told the media the participation of European officials this week in a protest rally in Tbilisi against the controversial law on transparency of foreign influence, “negatively affects” the image of their countries and the European Union as a whole.

Kobakhidze’s comments followed after the visiting foreign ministers from Latvia, Estonia, Iceland and Lithuania joined the rally against the law on Rustaveli Avenue on Wednesday.

I hope that we will not see such frivolous acts in the future”, the Head of the Government noted.

The PM claimed the protest rallies were “completely organised by specific [political] parties and non-governmental organisations related to them [political parties]”, adding this fact did not exclude the participation of people in the protest who were not affiliated with these parties.

In response to a journalist's question regarding the Lithuanian FM Gabrielius Landsbergis’ statement on the “relinquishment of some of the sovereignty by Georgia on the way to the European Union”, Kobakhidze called the statement “concerning”.

When a country becomes a member of the EU, at that time it concedes some of significant part of its sovereignty, that is a fact, but when a foreign minister of a particular country makes this statement in the context of a rally of political minorities, it certainly causes some concern”, he explained.

The Head of the Government noted that one of the ruling team members had made a similar statement about the EU “a few months ago”, for which this person had faced “a lot of criticism” from domestic opposition, and emphasised “this simple truth was repeated three times by the Lithuanian FM”.