Protesters rally across Georgia for third night over EU decision

Protesters gathered across Georgia on Saturday night in a third straight night of demonstrations against the government’s decision to suspend negotiations to join the European Union.

More than 100 demonstrators were arrested as crowds clashed with police Friday night, the country’s Interior Ministry said. The Associated Press saw protesters in Tbilisi being chased and beaten by police as demonstrators rallied in front of the country’s parliament building.

On the same night, police also used heavy force against members of the media and deployed water cannons to push protesters back along the capital’s central boulevard, Rustaveli Avenue.

The ruling Georgian Dream party's victory in the country’s Oct. 26 parliamentary election, which was widely seen as a referendum on Georgia’s aspirations to join the European Union, has sparked major demonstrations and led to an opposition boycott of the parliament.

The opposition has said that the vote was rigged with the help of Russia, with Moscow hoping to keep Tbilisi in its orbit.

'Ukrainisation' of Georgia

Speaking to the AP on Saturday, Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili said that Georgia was becoming a “quasi-Russian” state and that Georgian Dream controlled the country's major institutions.

“We have seen happening in the country — which is a country where we do not have any longer independent institutions, not the courts, not the Central Bank, and not, of course, the parliament,” she said.

“We have been moving more and more rapidly into a quasi-Russian model.”

Zourabichvili also rejected statements made by Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze, who characterised the protests as “violent demonstrations.”

In a statement on Saturday, he said Tbilisi remained committed to European integration. However, he said that unspecified “foreign entities” wished to see the “Ukrainisation” of Georgia with a “Maidan-style scenario” – a reference to Ukraine’s 2014 Maidan revolution.

“We are not demanding a revolution. We are asking for new elections, but in conditions that will ensure that the will of the people will not be misrepresented or stolen again,” Zourabichvili said.

Zurabishvili will not step down

President Zurabishvili told AFP in an exclusive interview on Saturday that she will not step down until last month's contested parliamentary elections are re-run.

Calling herself "the only legitimate institution in the country", Zurabishvili insisted that "as long as there are no new elections... my mandate continues" despite Georgia's newly elected parliament, which faces a legitimacy crisis, having said it will elect her replacement on December 14.