Protesters clashed with police in Georgia’s capital for a fourth straight night on Sunday, with signs that opposition was spreading across the country to the government’s decision to suspend talks on joining the European Union.
Georgia’s Ministry of Internal Affairs said on Monday that 21 police officers were injured during a crackdown against pro-EU demonstrations by thousands of people.
In total, 224 people have been arrested during the rallies supported by pro-West President Salome Zourabichvili .
“Another powerful night of Georgians standing firm to defend their constitution and their European choice. The determination in the streets shows no signs of stopping!” Zourabichvili , who supports Georgia’s integration with the EU, posted on X.
Tensions have been rising for months in the country of 3.7 million people between the governing party Georgian Dream and opponents who accuse it of pursuing increasingly authoritarian, anti-Western and pro-Russian policies.
The crisis has deepened since Thursday’s announcement that the government would freeze EU talks for four years, with thousands of pro-EU demonstrators facing off against police, who used tear gas and water cannon.
Zourabichvili called for pressure to be brought on the Constitutional Court to annul last month’s elections, won by Georgian Dream. Both the opposition and Zourabichvili say the poll was rigged.
Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze has rebuffed calls for new elections.
Beyond the capital, Georgian news agency Interpress said demonstrators had blocked an access road into the country’s main commercial port in the Black Sea city of Poti.
Georgian media reported protests in at least eight cities and towns. Opposition TV channel Formula showed footage of people in Khashuri, a town of 20,000 in central Georgia, throwing eggs at the local Georgian Dream office.
Kobakhidze shrugged off Washington’s announcement on Saturday that it was suspending a strategic partnership with Tbilisi. He said this was a “temporary event”, and Georgia would talk to the new administration of President-elect Donald Trump when it takes office in January.
President Zourabichvili said on Saturday she would not step down when her term ends this month, saying the new parliament was illegitimate and had no authority to name her successor.
For much of the period since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, Georgia has leaned strongly towards the West and tried to loosen the influence of Russia, to which it lost a brief war in 2008. It became an official candidate for EU entry last year and has been promised eventual NATO membership.
But domestic opponents and Western governments have become concerned that the Georgian Dream is intent – despite its denials – on abandoning that course. In June, it enacted a law obliging nongovernmental organisations to register as “foreign agents” if they received more than 20 percent of their funding from abroad. Parliament in September approved a law curbing LGBTQ rights.
The government says it is defending the country’s sovereignty and trying to prevent it from suffering the fate of Ukraine by being dragged into a new war with Russia.