Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs James O’Brien Remarks to Media in Tbilisi

Thank you for being here tonight.  I’m very glad.  I’ve just completed a full day of meetings with members of the government, including the Prime Minister, the Foreign Minister, and the Speaker of Parliament.  I met the President and I’ve met with members of civil society and with the opposition.  I came here because the United States deeply values our relationship with Georgia.  We’ve seen it as a strategic partnership and frankly, some of the recent speeches here and the actions in the Parliament have made us wonder whether our strategic interests are so shared by the government.

We’ve had a long partnership with Georgia since 1992.  The United States has spent more than $6 billion in assistance.  We’ve consistently supported the development of Georgia’s governing institutions, from its military to its government, its regulatory bodies, and free and fair elections.

So for more than 30 years, the US has been a strong partner of Georgia, and we hope to continue that partnership.  We’ve especially valued the relationship as Georgia has sought to grow closer to European and transatlantic institutions.

Note that it was a government led by the Georgian Dream that enshrined in Georgia’s own constitution the commitment to moving toward Europe and the transatlantic relations.  We were proud to have supported Georgia’s aspiration for candidacy to the European Union, and we continue to work very closely on Georgia’s development progress toward membership in NATO.

So when I came here, I was a little disturbed to find that there are two very different conversations.  One concerns the law on foreign influence.  Some advocates of the law say that transparency of funding must be a prime national interest of Georgia.  And they feel that some Western funders are not as transparent as we might be.

Our interest is in seeing Georgia converge with European Union and transatlantic norms for addressing issues like transparency.  Frankly, we think neither the process nor the actual law implemented meets that standard and we hope to have more discussions to see any step on transparency matching European norms as Georgia goes forward.  We were promised that there would be the opportunity for this before the law was implemented.  And I was very clear that there would be consequences if the law were implemented as it now stands.

The Prime Minister has referred to this as coercion, but it’s not.  Georgia is attempting to join the EU and NATO.  Those organizations have certain standards and certain referees that say what the rules are, and we simply want Georgia to continue to match those standards rather than to deviate.  But there is a sense because a decision by Georgia to not converge with Europe would be a rejection of the path that is in Georgia’s own constitution.

We believe, and we see it in the polls, we see it on the streets, we hear it from every political party, including Georgian Dream, backers of Georgian Dream, the business community, and others – the Georgian people very much want to continue down that path, and we will stand with them as we have for more than 30 years.  And we will stand with them going forward.

So in this sense, if the conversations that we discussed today happen and the law is properly modified, it will be a way of strengthening our partnership rather than wrenching it apart, which I fear that it is now doing.

But that was just one kind of conversation that I had.  And the law is a small part of a broader conversation.  The broader conversation concerns comments by leaders of Georgian Dream.  That there is a global war party and that Georgia must turn away from the commitments made to the global war party.  And that there is a conspiracy by the West to remove Georgian Dream from office, despite 12 years of strong cooperation.  This is like a Reddit page came to life.  It is unreal, wrong, and a complete misunderstanding of the international community’s relationship to Georgia.

One example of it is what the Prime Minister mentioned last night.  So we had reached out for conversations with all stakeholders.  We had invited the Prime Minister to Washington to discuss the law and the relationship. The European Union had discussions here and was promised time for a conversation about the law.  And I asked, before coming here, I was happy to see Mr. Ivanishvili again.  The Prime Minister said he would not see me because we have him under de facto sanctions.  There are no sanctions on him at this point.  For such an influential individual to be that badly misinformed is shocking and disappointing.  For the Prime Minister to say that that is a reason that one of Georgia’s most important partners cannot meet with this citizen is to elevate that individual interest above the country’s constitutional commitment to working more with international partners and joining the EU and NATO.

So that is why I say the law is just one part of a broader conversation.  But it captures what I think is so important and could be a turning point in what has been till now a constructive and productive partnership.  If there are going to be demonstrations, we want them to be peaceful and we want the police presence to be peaceful.  We want there to be no intimidation of the protesters or others—either at the demonstration or at their homes or against their property.  As has happened in recent days, the people responsible for that intimidation should be found and prosecuted.

If the law goes forward without conforming to EU norms and this kind of rhetoric and aspersions against the US and other partners continue, I think the relationship is at risk.  Just a few examples: the US has about $390 million in assistance that we are planning to spend with Georgian authorities.  Half on military assistance, a little more or about another third roughly on economic development projects, and more on building institutions along with some for civil society.  All that has to be under review if we are now regarded as an adversary and not a partner.

And if the law goes forward out of conformity with EU norms and there’s undermining of democracy here and there’s violence against peaceful protesters – peaceful protestors, then we will see restrictions coming from the United States.  Those tend to be financial and/or travel restrictions on the individuals responsible for those actions and their families.

But I say these things not because I want them to happen, but because I want Georgia to have a continued peaceful path toward the EU and NATO with a robust democracy.
And hope is that that’s the path that will begin again today. And if not, we will revisit these topics very soon.

Question regarding problems with the law on foreign influence
Question regarding what types of standards the law should meet
Question regarding whether the law could be modified or discussed 

Assistant Secretary O’Brien:  To the last question, the Prime Minister said yes.  Two kinds of answers to the first two questions. So our concern is with the manner in which the law came about, that we want to see Georgia work toward integration but to do it in the manner in which typically European states or partners develop rules like this rather than forcing it through over the objections and expressed concerns of partners.

Today we discussed a number of difficulties with the law.  I raised some, not all agreed to, but they center around the law is under-inclusive.  It applies only to foreign and in practice only to certain foreign sources of funding.  This means it does not address all the problems it’s intended to address.

So the effect then is to place a stigma on entities that are believed to be covered by the law. Those entities happen to be among the most open in Georgia because they talk about their sources of funding or other things.  But the organizations that run under the table that are probably financed from other countries than Western countries will not be captured.  And that stigma can be very damaging as we saw with the vandalism and attacks on individuals identified as coming from those groups in the past week.  That’s why the European Court of Human Rights express concern about laws that are limited in this way to just foreign financing. That’s just one problem.

Many laws in this area of transparency are conduct-based.  So they would apply to anyone attempting to influence politics, not just to certain organizations.  And they would be subject to judicial review before penalties.  This law allows the Ministry of Justice to have access to all records of a covered organization – not just financial records, but all records.  And then to impose fines which can only then be contested in court.  So it reverses the approach from U.S. laws, for example.

But again, the primary issue is that by the time we joined discussion, the European Union and we asked to have further consultations and were told no, this will be pushed through in three quick readings.  And that is what we’ve seen.