“Existential Challenge” Looms over Georgia, President Zurabishvili Tells Lithuanian Seimas
President Salome Zurabishvili said that Georgia is facing “an existential challenge” as democratic institutions are being systematically dismantled by the ruling party, urging Europe to act quickly before Georgia is lost to Russian influence because “challenges go beyond the Georgian experiment.”
“The crisis in Georgia has escalated beyond electoral fraud, beyond the mere political crisis,” Zurabishvili said, while addressing Lithuania’s Parliament on March 25. “We are confronting a somehow different challenge that we can only qualify as an existential challenge, an assertion of our destiny.”
She made a direct appeal to the European Union and NATO, warning of dire consequences for the continent if Georgia falls under Russian control. “Europe must act now,” she said. “If we allow Georgia to fall back into Russian hands, it will not just be a tragedy for my country. It will be a strategic disaster for Europe. It will prove that Russia no longer needs military aggression, military invasions, to achieve its goals.”
“The Russian Nightmare Is Coming Back”
Speaking before Lithuania’s Seimas, president Zurabishvili accused the ruling Georgian Dream party of reversing the country’s democratic progress and aligning its governance with Russia’s authoritarian model.
“The ruling party… suddenly decides on the 28th of November last to turn its back on its own promises… starts to push Georgia back under Russian domination and back into a Russian model of governing the country,” Zurabishvili said.
She criticized the government for abandoning its pro-European commitments, warning that Georgia risks falling further into Moscow’s sphere of influence. “The Russian nightmare, which we thought was part of history since our independence, is coming back to haunt us in the 21st century.”
Zurabishvili also condemned the government’s crackdown on dissent, saying that journalists, students, civil society leaders, and opposition figures are being unfairly detained. “In Georgia today, we are a nation under repression,” she said.
She accused the authorities of using the judiciary and police as political tools, citing the arrests of peaceful protesters, the ongoing trial of 11 of them today, the detention of Mzia Amaghlobeli, director of the Batumelebi/Netgazeti media outlet. “These are ordinary citizens who believe in freedom. And yet, in today’s Georgia, believing in democracy is enough to put you behind bars,” she said.
Financial Sanctions and Repressions as the “Only Policy” of GD
Zurabishvili denounced the financial consequences of repression, saying that harsh economic penalties are being used to weaken activists and their families. “These are deliberately designed to financially cripple activists and their families,” she said, citing the burden of financial sanctions in relation to average salaries.
Moreover, the President stressed that the ruling party is no longer governing but is entirely focused on suppressing opposition. “There is no economic policy, no foreign policy… Repression has become the only and exclusive policy,” she said. “So this is not just an erosion of democracy. It is its systematic destruction that carries with it the de facto annihilation of the state.”
She criticized Georgian Dream’s plan to introduce a U.S.-inspired Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), which would replace the current foreign agents law. Zurabishvili said that civil society and independent media face “suffocating restrictions” – just like in Russia under Putin’s infamous “foreign agents” law, which is going to be made even stricter under the so-called American model “FARA law”, “which has nothing to do with the American model”, she stressed.
The president accused the ruling party of dismantling independent institutions and consolidating power under its founder and honorary chairman, Bidzina Ivanishvili. “The one-party, but in reality one-man rule has taken over the state, over politics, over social life. Georgia’s independence itself is under siege.”
She called towards going beyond the “de facto non-recognition” of the regime, saying that the European Union “should express more support to what is the only known stable and peaceful way out of the current stand-off, between the ruling party and the protests that are entering their fifth month: new elections in a free and fair environment.”
Strategic Test for Europe
Zurabishvili emphasized that Georgia’s crisis as part of a larger geopolitical threat from the Kremlin. “This is a test for Europe itself,” she said. “The events that are unfolding in my country are part of a much larger plan, one orchestrated by Moscow to re-establish its control over the Black Sea, the Caucasus, and Europe’s access to Central Asia.”
Zurabishvili also criticized the blocking by the GD government’s of key infrastructure projects like the Anaklia seaport. “The Anaklia Deep Sea project, our chance to create a trade corridor independent of Russian control, has been blocked by this pro-Russian ruling party in Georgia, while China is being welcomed to take control of this key infrastructure,” she said.
Zurabishvili urged the European Union and NATO to take a closer look at financial networks supporting the regime, “which are today helping Russia to make Georgia a sanctions evasion hub.” She warned that a new offshore law has created a “gray zone” for sanctioned oligarchs and illicit financial activity.
“The EU cannot remain passive,” she said, advocating for sanctions tied to democratic conditions, including early elections. “If we do not find this alternative together, Georgia risks either full Russian control or dangerous instability.”
New Black Sea and Caucasus Security Strategy
Zurabishvili stressed that the stakes go beyond Georgia’s borders. “This is not just about defending Georgia. It is about defending Europe’s own strategic future and its own identity,” she said.
She called for a new Black Sea and Caucasus security strategy—one that secures Europe’s access to Central Asia, strengthens NATO’s presence, and blocks Russian and Chinese expansion into the region is “indispensable.” Stressing that such a strategy needs a partner in a stable and democratic Georgia, she stressed that Georgia’s fate will influence the path that its neighbor Armenia. Zurabishvili underlined that the progress in the peace talks between Armenia and Azerbaijan opens the way to a stronger and peaceful Caucasus, “which needs again Georgia to hold its positions and be the strong anchor of our EU and American partners as it has been for the past three decades.”
She also warned that failure in Georgia would affect the EU’s credibility. “If Europe… cannot find the ways to have leverage on a small country with a massively pro-European population… then the challenge goes much beyond Georgia and will affect the credibility of EU’s foreign policy.”
President Salome Zurabishvili delivered a speech at Seimas as part of her visit to the Baltic states, which began in Lithuania. Before her address, she met with top Lithuanian officials, including President Gitanas Nausėda, Parliament Speaker Saulius Skvernelis, Deputy Speaker Radvilė Morkūnaitė and several MPs, including Laurynas Kasčiūnas, Žygimantas Pavilionis and Ingrida Šimonytė.
Also Read:
- 20/03/2025 – Salome Zurabishvili Urges EU Leaders to Discuss Georgia at European Council Meeting
- 27/02/2025 – Zurabishvili Presents “Path to New Elections”
- 25/02/2025 – Salome Zurabishvili: “We Should not Allow Another 1921 to Happen”
- 20/02/2025 – Zurabishvili: GD Might Have to Call New Elections
- 15/02/2025 – Salome Zurabishvili Attends Munich Security Conference 2025
- 05/02/2025 – President Zurabishvili: “Political Life in Georgia Has Ended,” Urges International Pressure on GD to Call Elections
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