Georgian PM says no external force should be allowed to influence domestic political processes

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze on Wednesday said that no external force should be allowed to influence the domestic political processes.

In his interview with Imedi TV, Kobakhidze noted that the new United States administration confirmed what the Georgian Government had been saying all along - that certain funding sources had been used to destabilise the country, primarily through NGO funding.

“You remember the opposition’s rhetoric when we were discussing and adopting the transparency law. They insisted that it was unthinkable for Western funding to have any negative impact, regardless of its origin. However, now, the US administration itself has openly stated that American taxpayers’ money was being used in various countries, including Georgia, to create instability”, the PM said.

He emphasised it was crucial to further enhance regulations related to financial transparency, noting that the Georgian Parliament was actively working on enhancing such measures.

“While there are significant changes regarding USAID and NED, the deep state can easily restructure funding mechanisms. We see similar trends when it comes to prolonging war efforts - while the US has refused to continue funding prolonged conflicts, they are now trying to shift this financial burden onto Europe. A similar pattern can be observed in the funding of NGOs in Georgia, where there are attempts to reallocate funds to support revolutionary activities”, he continued.

“The transparency law must counteract these attempts, regardless of whether the donor organisation is USAID, NED, or the European Endowment for Democracy (EED), which operates as a European counterpart to NED and has openly financed revolutionary processes and radical parties in Georgia, violating both the Constitution and legal principles”, the PM pointed out.

“We cannot allow external funding of politics in this country, let alone external funding of radical politics. In this country, the decision-maker and initiator of all processes that are directly or indirectly related to politics can be the only entity, and this is the Georgian people and no one else. No one can try to change the political situation in this country in any way based on external funding”, he concluded.