In response to the EU Council’s decision to suspend visa-free travel for Georgian diplomats, Georgian Parliament Speaker, Shalva Papuashvili, expressed hope that “the U.S. won’t see visa-free suspension with EU if banal truth about two genders, family values discomforts someone in Brussels.”

According to the Council’s statement, “The decision is a reaction to the adoption last year by Georgia of a Law on transparency of foreign influence and a legislative package on family values and protection of minors.”

Papuashvili called it “an absolutely ineffective decision, which is symbolic in its meaning.”

“In truth, underlying this is a desire to politically punish the Georgian people since they did not support the campaign initiated in Georgia by several authorities, including EU Member State representatives, who spoke at demonstrations against the Georgian Dream.” The Parliament Speaker highlighted what he called the “hypocrisy” of the decision by drawing a historical parallel.

He pointed out that the EU granted diplomatic visa-free travel in 2010 during the Saakashvili administration, a period he claimed was marked by serious democratic deficiencies, including the Girgvliani murder case, media suppression, and business racketeering. In contrast, he noted that the general population only received visa-free travel benefits under Georgian Dream’s governance.

“Are these authorities now making democratic claims? When Saakashvili’s authoritarian regime, the regime’s officials and leaders were allowed visa-free travel, the European Union did not provide anything to the populace at the time.

For seven years, Georgians need visas to enter the European Union. However, the Georgian Dream achieved visa-free travel for all Georgians. In 2010, the European Union and Brussels gave visa-free travel to the leaders of Georgia’s racketeering, dictatorial, business-stealing, and human-torturing dictatorship while doing nothing for the country’s people.

We waited four years for discussions to begin, but Brussels would not even consider it, and now the same Brussels is talking to us as if this is the result of democratic backsliding. What we heard from Brussels today was hypocritical and cynical,” the Speaker asserted.

According to Papuashvili, visa-free travel is a bilateral agreement and should not be violated unilaterally.

“Therefore, we will look at what is taken here as the basis for violation of this agreement, and we will analyse what we are dealing with.

We know whose country is doing this, and they claim it is a breach of international law. An international agreement is an international legal document, and violating it is disrespectful to international law.

Despite the fact that four opposition parties have cleared the election threshold and everyone has equal access to media, parties, and other activities, they see a democratic backsliding. It’s a pity that Brussels is everywhere and Europe is nowhere. “It is unfortunate that Brussels has distanced itself from European values,” Papuashvili added.