Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papauashvili set down in an interview with GPB First Channel’s Actual Saturday program, reviewing recent developments around the People’s Power-tabled draft bills on the Transparency of Foreign Influence that prompted street protests.

The Speaker deemed recent events “a very sophisticated wave of disinformation and propaganda that spread around the draft law which was not even put on paper when it was branded as a Russian law.”

Alluding to the protest rallies, Papuashvili claimed that he had never witnessed such violence during Georgian protests, when Molotov cocktails were thrown, including within the parliament building. “It is crucial that society consider the origins of this violence.”

He went on to say that politicians “badly intervened” in this process as they organized the violence when one of the MPs called for picketing the parliament.

“As of right now, our nation leads the globe in terms of governmental institutions’ transparency. The parties’ financial transparency is completely guaranteed. The Audit Office website provides access to the property declarations of public employees and elected politicians. The only non-governmental groups whose finances are closed are those that influence political choices.