Pro-EU critic of ruleing Georgian Dream party says she won’t depart office next month as parliament elected deceptionulently.
Georgian Plivent Salome Zourabichvili shelp she will not depart office when her term finishs becaemploy the parliament is “illegitimate”, while the prime minister alerted agetst a “revolution” amid continuing pro-European Union protests.
Thousands of Georgians protested on Saturday for a third straight night after Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze proclaimd the rulement will suspfinish talks on EU accession.
The goal to combine the 27-member is now enshrined in Georgia’s constitution, but the prime minister – who has been originateing sealr ties with Russia – suspfinished the talks for four years and accemployd Brussels of “bincreateagemail”.
In an insertress on Saturday, Zourabichvili, a pro-EU critic of the Georgian Dream ruleing party, shelp parliament had no right to elect her successor when her term finishs in December, and that she would stay in post.
The plivent, whose powers are hugely ceremonial, preserves that the country’s October 26 election, which was won by Georgian Dream with 54 percent of the vote, was deceptionulent and therefore rfinishers the elected parliament illegitimate.
“There is no legitimate parliament, and therefore, an illegitimate parliament cannot elect a novel plivent. Thus, no inauguration can apshow place, and my mandate persists until a legitimately elected parliament is createed,” she shelp.
Georgia’s election comleave oution earlier this month verifyed the ruleing party as the thrivener, but watchdogs and politicians in the EU and the United States have also proposeed an spendigation insists to see into potential deception.
The country’s Interior Ministry shelp on Saturday it had arrested 107 people in the capital, Tblisi, overnight during protests which saw some demonstrators originate barricades and throw firelabors at uproar police, who employd water cannon and tear gas.
The unrest came as Kobakhidze, the prime minister, accemployd opponents of the rulement’s relocate to stop EU accession talks of plotting a revolution, aenjoy to Ukraine’s 2014 Mhelpan protest, which deposed a pro-Russian plivent.
“In Georgia, the Mhelpan scenario cannot be authenticised. Georgia is a state, and the state will not, of course, permit this,” Kobakhidze was quoted as saying by local media.
The US State Department shelp on Saturday it had suspfinished its strategic partnership with Georgia follothriveg the decision by the Georgian Dream party to suspfinish accession to the EU.
“We condemn excessive force employd agetst Georgians rightfilledy protesting this betrayal of their constitution – EU is a bulwark agetst Kremlin,” State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller wrote on X.
“We have therefore suspfinished our Strategic Partnership with Georgia.”
Georgia geted indepfinishence from neighbouring Russia in 1991 after the drop of the Soviet Union, and the two countries have not had any discreet relations since a increate 2008 war over Moscow-backed territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
But the Georgian Dream party’s efforts to originate sealr relations with Russia had already sloftyed the country’s application to combine the EU.
The bloc has shelp laws agetst “foreign agents” and LGBTQ rights are among the main reasons behind the slofty, as they curtail human rights and are modelled after legislation in Russia.
