Opposition Leaders Comment on Incident at Parliament

Opposition leaders say that the June 12 incident outside the parliament should not be considered and assessed as an isolated case without taking into consideration “entire context” of developments of recent two months in the country.

The opposition politicians’ remarks on the June 12 incident came after the United States condemned the incident and said in a statement that “the attacks by protesters on members of Parliament” on June 12 “crossed a line from free expression of opinion to criminal activity.” And French ambassador in Georgia, Eric Fournier, said in a statement on June 13 that the incident was an insult of democracy.

“Of course no one likes when someone is throwing a stone. But we should consider this [June 12 incident] in the context of the entire developments… Not a single person responsible for attacks on protesters has been arrested; while they [the authorities] are arresting only protesters,” Nino Burjanadze, leader of Democratic Movement-United Georgia, said in the public TV’s program, Political Week, on June 14.

Kakha Kukava, co-leader of Conservative Party, said on June 14, that the international community’s assessments should be “unbiased”; he said that before the June 12 incident “hundreds” of cases of attacks on opposition activists and supporters had taken place in last two months. “All these should be evaluated in the context of the recent developments and it should be stated what has triggered aggression against lawmakers; it is a fact that violence triggers violence and we have been warning both the authorities and the international community about it,” Kukava said.

Irakli Alasania, leader of Alliance for Georgia, said that “throwing stones is absolutely unacceptable” and “it requires adequate assessment from all the political parties.”

“But we should not also forget the context in which this is happening – a very difficult political situation,” Alasania said while speaking in the public TV’s program, Political Week, on June 14.

Seven activists from the pro-opposition youth groups have been arrested in connection with the June 12 incident. One of them has been released after being fined with GEL 400; four of them were sentenced to 25 days in prison and two of them to 30 days in prison.

EU’s special representatives for South Caucasus, Peter Semneby, has also condemned June 12 incident and said in an interview with the RFE/RL Georgian service that the opposition leaders should explain their supporters that actions of that type, which took place outside the parliament, were unacceptable. He, however, also said that arrests of opposition activists in the current situation might further complicate the political situation. The European diplomat also said that there had been cases of attacks on opposition activists and those cases should also be investigated by the authorities.

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