Opposition parties “ready to join” President’s action plan to unify ahead of elections

The opposition United National Movement, Akhali, Lelo, Droa, Girchi - More Freedom, European Georgia and Strategy Agmashenebeli parties on Sunday expressed their readiness to sign a charter submitted by the Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili to “rebuild trust and to forge a new political reality” in the county ahead of the upcoming parliamentary elections.

The document envisages abolishing “laws harmful to the European path” of the country, “liberating the judiciary” and “restoring trust”, ensuring a “fundamental reform” of the Supreme Council of Justice and creating “appropriate conditions for holding free and fair elections”.

“I propose this plan to political parties [and call on them to] decide by June 1 whether they accept the responsibility of taking and fulfilling these steps before the Georgian people”, Zourabichvili said.

The President also added a “new political model” would be presented to the country’s partners in Brussels, “so we can restore the European Union accession process and open accession negotiations as soon as possible”.

The development follows the ruling Georgian Dream party's adoption of a law on transparency of foreign influence, which requires groups “considered to be an organisation pursuing the interests of a foreign power” - determined by more than 20 percent of their funding coming from abroad - to be registered in the public registry with the status and publicise their received funding..

The law has been met by public protests and criticism by some of the country’s foreign partners.

The parliamentary elections are scheduled for October 26.