The Daily Beat: 18 January
The European Parliament scolded the Member States for their lack of will “to step away from their
individual, political, or economic interests” and handle the threats in the neighborhood coming from Russia’s aggressive behavior. The failure to ensure that Russia honors the 2008 Russo-Georgian ceasefire agreement was mentioned as one such area, while Russian troops were referred to as “occupying forces” in the text.
PM Irakli Garibashvili was seen hobnobbing with the Davos crowd and participated in the panel discussion titled “New Dawn of Eurasia?“, where his overture to China was enthusiastically backed by Serbia’s Aleksandar Vucic, Europe’s other enfant terrible. Perhaps reinvigorated by a newly found friend or just the chill Davos air, the PM who lately avoided polarizing statements, relapsed and called opposition UNM “a force that is countering the interests of our country and our people”, and other opposition parties “little losers”.
The Ministry of Justice brushed aside all but technical observations of the Council of Europe’s anti-torture committee (CPT) related to the conditions of detention of ex-president Mikheil Saakashvili. CPT, the guardian of the anti-torture treaty, said the constraints imposed on Saakashvili by the custodial presence and video surveillance at the VivaMedi clinic create a “situation that is oppressive, degrading, and not conducive to improving his health condition.”
The Swiss Court said there is no evidence that the troubled Credit Suisse (now absorbed by UBS) intended to launder Bidzina Ivanishvili’s money that its rogue trader, Patrice Lescaudron, had stolen from him.
According to Forbes, from January to December 2023, Russian citizens registered a staggering 13,000 legal entities in Georgia.
