PACE adopted a resolution with 114 votes ratifying the credentials of the Georgian delegation but called on Tbilisi to address “continuing and rapid backsliding of democracy” in the country.
The resolution further called for the creation of an electoral environment that is "conducive to genuinely democratic new parliamentary elections to be announced during the coming months" as well as for revoking the country’s controversial foreign influence law, which was adopted in June last year.
“We, the members of the Georgian Parliamentary Delegation in Strasbourg and Tbilisi, have debated and, by a collective decision of the Georgian Dream team, are ceasing our work in the Parliamentary Assembly beginning today,” Thea Tsulukiani, the head of the Georgian delegation to PACE, told reporters in Strasbourg.
“Many individuals, particularly our anti-state opposition and members of non-governmental organizations, opposed the acknowledgement of the new Georgian parliament delegation’s credentials,” Tsulukiani said, adding PACE eventually recognized them but also outlined certain conditions which she said are “unacceptable” to Tbilisi because they are “unjust and unfounded.”
She also defined the condition to hold new parliamentary elections in the country as “totally unacceptable” because it “disregards the will and realities of over 1,120,000 voters.”
“We believe that as long as the completely unjust and unfounded blackmail against the Georgian people’s elected government continues, no importance is placed on evidence and facts, discussions are biased and marked by an insulting attitude towards our country’s population, and our parliamentary delegation’s participation in the Assembly has no meaning or justification,” she said.
She added that while Georgia is still a member of the Council of Europe, the members of its delegation will return to the assembly only following changes in its approach towards the country and its people, and after officials understand that putting pressure on Georgia will not push the country to take any “anti-Georgian actions.”
On Oct. 26 last year, Georgia’s ruling Georgian Dream party won an 89-seat majority in the 150-seat parliament after receiving 53.93% of the vote during the country's parliamentary election.
While Georgian Dream officials welcomed the result, Salome Zourabichvili, who was then president and is considered to be pro-EU, said she did not recognize the results, claiming that Georgians had witnessed a "Russian special operation" with the election, which opposition parties have labeled "stolen."
AzVision.az
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