A brawl broke out in the Georgian parliament on Monday after the ruling party moved forward with a controversial bill on “foreign agents” that has been criticised by Western countries.
Mamuka Mdinaradze, leader of the ruling Georgian Dream party’s parliamentary faction and a driving force behind the bill, was punched in the face by opposition MP Aleko Elisashvili while speaking from the dispatch box.
Footage broadcast on Georgian television, and on the parliament’s livestream, captured the moment politicians came to blows, which led to a wider punch-up between several politicians.
Such altercations are not uncommon in Georgia’s often raucous parliament, where there was also a fistfight over the bill in March.
Georgian Dream said earlier this month it would reintroduce legislation requiring organisations that accept funds from abroad to register as foreign agents or face fines, 13 months after protests forced it to shelve the plan.
Criticism from EU and US
The bill has been criticised by European countries and the United States.The European Union, which gave Georgia candidate status in December 2023, has said the move is incompatible with the bloc’s values.
The law would require organisations receiving more than 20 per cent of their funding from overseas to register as “foreign agents” and submit to monitoring by the justice ministry, or else face hefty fines.
Critics have compared it to a 2012 Russian law, which has been steadily expanded since then and used to crack down on Russian civil society and independent media.
Russia is widely unpopular in Georgia, due to Moscow’s support for the breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Russia defeated Georgia in a short war in 2008.
Several hundred demonstrators gathered outside the Georgian parliament building ahead of a mass protest that civil society organisations have called for.
Georgian Dream, which says it wants to join the EU and NATO even as it has deepened ties with Moscow, says the bill is necessary to combat what it calls “pseudo-liberal values” imposed by foreigners, and to promote transparency.
Once approved by members of the legislature’s legal affairs committee, which is controlled by Georgian Dream and its allies, the foreign agent bill can proceed to a first reading in parliament.