Veteran Georgia-Watchers Call on the U.S. to Appoint Presidential Envoy, Apply Sanctions
The veteran researchers and Georgia watchers from the U.S. policy community, Svante E. Cornell and Stephen Frederick Starr sent a letter to senior officials at the US Departments of State, Commerce, Justice, and the National Security Council, as well as the US Congress, in which they call on the U.S. to develop “policy designed to stop Georgia’s turn away from the West” and propose steps to “address the deteriorating situation in Georgia.” This is according to RFE/RL and the letter seen by Civil.ge.
Cornell and Starr say that “the US should now take determined action in Georgia” and identify “Georgia’s richest man,” Bidzina Ivanishvili, as the problem underwriting the country’s democratic backsliding. They say Ivanishvili has captured the state and is now turning Georgia in an anti-Western direction, despite the demonstrated will of the Georgian people to the contrary, which, they warn, “could have irrevocable implications.”
They also stress that “it is clear that Ivanishvili considers a Euro-American orientation as contrary to his interests because the standards that Euro-Atlantic integration would impose on Georgia would make his continued control over Georgia state untenable.”
They stress that the gravitation toward Moscow that “deeply infiltrated Georgian politics and society” contradicts both the Georgian Constitution and the will of its people. The authors recall the crude attacks on the US Ambassador, the rejection of the nomination of a previous Ambassador in 2018, the hostile rhetoric of the ruling party accusing the West of dragging Georgia into war, as well as the recent attempt to adopt the Foreign Agents’ law.
Noting that “Georgia’s current trajectory is unsustainable” and puts at risk all the progress Georgia has made over the past two decades and emphasizing that Moscow still has the ability to intervene politically and militarily in Georgia “if only divert attention from its failures in Ukraine,” the authors offer a set of recommendations.
Recommendations
The recommendations address key questions at hand: the integrity of the 2024 elections; the fate of former President Saakashvili; Ivanishvili’s domination of Georgian politics and society; and the continued integration of Georgia into Euro-Atlantic structures.
On the 2024 parliamentary elections, “US must clearly indicate that its future relationships with Georgia will be contingent on the process by which they are held.” In a situation when both administrative and financial power is in Ivanishvili’s control, “the US should insist on a fair electoral process today as it did in the past.”
The authors recommend the U.S. deepen the restrictive measures applied recently through travel restrictions on four key representatives of the Georgian judiciary implicated in corruption. They suggest first targeting the authors of the so-called “foreign agent law” by “calling the bluff” that separates the People’s Power – a Georgina Dream spinoff- that formally initiated the draft and “provided the government with a fig leaf of deniability.” The letter also recommends targeting the anti-Western propaganda channel PosTV and its owner, Viktor Japaridze, both affiliated with People’s Power. As a subsequent step, should these measures fail, the two recommend targeting Mr. Ivanishvili’s immediate entourage and the man himself.
Cornell and Starr state that there has been a distinct pattern of politically motivated justice in Georgia and call on the US “to actively work for the transfer Mr. Saakashvili to a medical facility in a European state as a necessary condition for normal relations between the US and Georgia.”
Among other measures, the authors call for better U.S. coordination with the EU on Georgia-related issues and recommend designating a “presidential envoy” who should be a senior American figure with a mission focused on preventing further anti-Western and undemocratic initiatives, securing the integrity of the 2024 elections and communicating directly to the Georgian people.
Also Read:
- 20/02/2023 – U.S. Embassy: The United States will Continue Supporting Georgian Civil Society
- 28/04/2023 – US Senator Jeanne Shaheen: There is an internal battle going on between autocracy and democracy in Georgia
- 19/04/2023 – US State Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Visits Georgia
- 05/04/2023 – BREAKING: US Department of State Sanctions Four Georgian Judges for “Significant” Corruption
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