The United States is suspending more than $95 million in aid to the Georgian government as a result of the country’s drift toward Kremlin-style authoritarianism, Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced Wednesday.
Blinken had ordered the State Department in May to conduct a review of Washington’s bilateral cooperation with Tbilisi after the Georgian parliament passed a controversial “foreign agents” law that designates civil society groups that receive more than 20 percent of their funding from abroad as “pursuing the interests of a foreign power.”
A strikingly similar law in Russia has been used to crack down on internal dissent.
Tens of thousands of Georgians came out to protest the legislation; police used tear gas to disperse the crowds, while opposition leaders were arrested and beaten, according to reports at the time.
Both the European Union and the United States condemned the law’s passage. Washington even imposed sanctions on leaders of the ruling Georgian Dream party, who have been accused of having close ties to the Kremlin. Georgian Dream in June again followed Moscow’s lead by proposing a law against “LGBT propaganda.”
“The Georgian government’s anti-democratic actions and false statements are incompatible with membership norms in the EU and NATO,” Blinken said in a statement.
He added that while the U.S. was freezing aid to the Georgian government, it would “continue assistance to programs and activities that benefit the people of Georgia by strengthening democracy, rule of law, independent media, and economic development.”
The EU has also responded forcefully, saying it stopped Georgia’s accession process earlier this month, which also effectively froze €30 million in financial assistance from the European Peace Facility.
Georgia is set to hold parliamentary elections in October. According to a July poll by Edison Research, Georgian Dream is still ahead of its divided rivals, but its popularity has plummeted to 32 percent.
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