US State Department official says “important to continue engaging with appropriate officials” of Georgian Gov’t

Vedant Patel, the Principal Deputy Spokesperson of the United States Department of State, on Monday told a press briefing it was “important to continue engaging with appropriate officials” of the Georgian Government, after the US imposed sanctions against members of the ruling Georgian Dream party, MPs of the Parliament, law enforcement and private citizens following adoption of a controversial domestic law on transparency of foreign influence.

[Georgia] it is a country we continue to have a range of issues that we want to prioritise in the context of that bilateral relationship with them”, Patel noted, adding the adopted law was “counter to Georgia’s own EU aspirations”.

The law requires 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.

It was supported by 84 MPs in the 150-member Parliament, with 30 voting against, and requires the groups “considered to be an organisation pursuing the interests of a foreign power” to be registered in the public registry with the status and publicise their received funding.