Georgia’s president will not step down until another ‘illegal’ election is held | Political Affairs

An EU critic of the ruling Georgian Dream party says he will not step down next month as the parliament voted fraudulently.

Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili said she will not leave her post when her term expires because the parliament is “illegitimate”, and the prime minister warned of “revolution” amid ongoing protests against the European Union.

Thousands of Georgians protested on Saturday for three consecutive nights after Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze announced that the government would suspend EU accession negotiations.

The intention to join the 27 members is now enshrined in Georgia’s constitution, but the prime minister – who has developed close ties with Russia – stalled talks for four years and accused Brussels of “disloyalty”.

In his speech on Saturday, Zourabichvili, who is an EU critic of the ruling Georgian Dream party, said that the parliament has no right to choose his successor when his term expires in December, and that he will remain in office.

The president, whose power is partly ceremonial, has maintained that the October 26 national elections, won by Georgian Dream with 54 percent of the vote, were fraudulent and therefore invalidated the elected parliament.

“There is no official parliament, therefore, the unofficial parliament cannot elect a new president. Therefore, no inauguration can be done, and my work continues until the establishment of a legally elected parliament,” he said.

Georgia’s election commission earlier this month confirmed that the ruling party had won, but watchdogs and politicians in the EU and the United States also suggested that the investigation needed to look into possible fraud.

The Ministry of the Interior said on Saturday it arrested 107 people in the capital, Tblisi, in one night during protests where some protesters picked up logs and threw explosives at the police who used water cannons and tear gas.

The unrest erupted when Kobakhidze, the prime minister, accused opponents of the government’s move to halt EU accession talks of planning a revolution similar to Ukraine’s 2014 Maidan protests, which ousted a pro-Russian president.

“In Georgia, the Maidan situation cannot be fulfilled. Georgia is a country, and the state will not allow this,” Kobakhidze was quoted as saying in the local media.

The US State Department said on Saturday that it has stopped its strategic cooperation with Georgia following the decision of the Georgia Dream group to stop entering the EU.

“We condemn the excessive use of force against the people of Georgia rightfully protesting this betrayal of their constitution – the EU is a bulwark against the Kremlin,” State Department spokesman Matthew Miller told X.

“Therefore we have suspended our strategic relationship with Georgia.”

Georgia gained independence from neighboring Russia in 1991 after the fall of the Soviet Union, and the two countries have not had diplomatic relations since a brief 2008 war over the Moscow-backed territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

But the Georgian Dream party’s efforts to build closer ties with Russia have already stalled the country’s bid to join the EU.

The bloc said laws against “foreign agents” and LGBTQ rights were among the main reasons behind the crackdown, as they curtail human rights and are enforced by Russian law.