Opposition Wants to Intensify Contacts with Diplomats after French Ambassador’s Remarks

Davit Gamkrelidze, the leader of New Rights Party, part of Alliance for Georgia, told protesters outside the Parliament on April 27, that the opposition leaders had decided to set up a group, which would be in charge of having close contacts with Tbilisi-based foreign diplomats to inform them about ongoing developments and protests.

The decision comes after the remarks by French ambassador in Georgia, Eric Fournier, made on April 25 before the meeting of the Georgian Parliamentary Chairman, Davit Bakradze, and foreign diplomats, accredited in Georgia, in the Sheraton Metekhi Palace hotel.

“I deplore that due to the activity of a few hundred people the head of the Parliament is obliged to work with us in a hotel. This is against the law and we deplore very much the fact that few people have decided to act illegally against democratic institution. This is not acceptable that we are obliged to come to a hotel for a meeting with the head of the Parliament and this is regrettable,” Ambassador Fournier told journalists.

Davit Bakradze, the parliamentary chairman, said on April 25, that the authorities were “tolerating many processes, which the governments of western European countries would not have tolerated.” “It is necessary for political pluralism and democracy in the country,” he added.

On April 24, a day before those remarks by the French ambassador, Tbilisi-based diplomatic missions of EU member states, European Commission Delegation and EU’s Special Representative for South Caucasus, Peter Semneby, released a joint statement, which said: “They [the European diplomats] commend both the opposition and the authorities for ensuring the free exercise of this right [of assembly] in a peaceful and secure way, with minimal inconvenience for the normal functioning of institutions and daily life of all citizens.”

On April 25, few hours after the statement by the French ambassador, Salome Zourabichvili, a former foreign minister and leader of opposition Georgia’s Way party, told protesters outside the Parliament: “I think he [Ambassador Fernier] is not well-informed about our laws and we will require a meeting with him to explain our laws.”

Politicians from the Alliance from Georgia refrained from making any specific comment immediately on that day, citing that they required listening to the original statement of the ambassador without Georgian translated voiceover, which was broadcasted extensively by the national television stations.  On April 27 Pikria Chikhradze of the New Rights Party, part of the Alliance for Georgia, joined the rhetoric of other opposition politicians and said that the French ambassador was not well informed about the Georgian legislature and a meeting was required with him to explain that the opposition was not violating the law.

“Picketing of a government buildings or the Parliament does not at all mean blocking of those buildings; we are not blocking them. If they [officials and lawmakers] can not enter the parliamentary building because they may feel uncomfortable passing through protesters that’s another matter, which has nothing to do with the blocking of the building,” Chikhradze told Tbilisi-based FM radio station, Ucnobi.

No parliamentary sessions have been held since the launch of protest rallies on April 9. Restrictions, according to the Parliamentary Chairman, are imposed in order to prevent any direct contact between the protesters and lawmakers.

The law on manifestations bans “complete blocking of entrances” of the Parliament, as well as of other government buildings and courts. Currently protesters’ improvised cells are blocking the Rustaveli Avenue, as well as some other streets, but not all of them, nearby the Parliament.

Davit Gamkrelidze, co-chairman of Alliance for Georgia, told protesters on April 27, that the group in charge of relations with the foreign diplomats would consist of Salome Zourabishvili; Irakli Alasania, the leader of Alliance for Georgia; Nino Burjanadze, a former parliamentary speaker and leader of Democratic Movement-United Georgia party and Kakha Kukava, co-leader of Conservative Party.

“The group will constantly work with foreign diplomats, who are provided with false information by our ‘beloved’ authorities,” Gamkrelidze said. “This group will have daily contacts with the diplomatic corps, ambassadors, embassies and international organizations in order to provide them with accurate information about what is happening on the Rustaveli Avenue, what is happening in the opposition and in the society and what kind of provocations the authorities are staging constantly.”

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