The European Union on Sunday sharply criticized the local elections held in Georgia over the weekend.
The vote on Saturday took place “amid a period of extensive crackdown on dissent,” according to a joint statement by EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas and Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos.
“Months of raids on independent media, the passing of laws targeting civil society, the jailing of opponents and activists or amendments to the electoral code favouring the ruling party, drastically reduced the possibility of having competitive elections.
“A large part of the opposition boycotted these elections, and the turnout was relatively low.”
Amid the prospect of new mass protests against the government, Kallas and Kos called for calm and restraint. They urged the Georgian authorities to respect citizens’ rights to freedom of assembly and expression.
In the capital Tbilisi, tens of thousands of people took to the streets on Saturday immediately after the vote to protest against the increasingly authoritarian turn by the ruling Georgian Dream party.
According to the Health Ministry, 21 police officers and six demonstrators were injured in clashes. Security forces arrested several suspected protest organizers. Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze described the unrest as an attempted coup.
On Sunday, several hundred demonstrators gathered outside the parliament building in Tbilisi, according to media reports. No incidents were reported by evening. The Interior Ministry had warned protesters against “continuing the actions” from the previous night and threatened a forceful response.
Georgia has been in political crisis since the disputed parliamentary election about a year ago.
The Georgian Dream party declared itself the winner of the vote, prompting pro-Western opposition parties to boycott parliament. When Kobakhidze later suspended Georgia’s constitutionally enshrined goal of EU integration, it triggered weeks of mass protests in Tbilisi and other cities.
