Georgian Parliament Speaker: European money being used in Georgia to fund people, groups with fascist ideology

Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili on Monday accused European donors of continuing to fund what he described as radical and extremist groups in Georgia, alleging that European funds were being used to support individuals and groups with “fascist ideology”.

Papuashvili made the remarks in response to a question about a concert by musician Kordzi, which the Danish Cultural Institute and the House of Arts are reportedly planning to hold at the end of September with EU support.

The journalist asked how acceptable it was to feature as the face of a festival a person who, according to the question, had offended more than one million Georgians.

According to Papuashvili, the issue demonstrated that EU funding for what he described as radicalism in Georgia was continuing.

“This includes the meeting in Bakhmaro and the funding of Armaz Akhvlediani’s political project. All of this shows that, unfortunately, support for radicalism and extremism in Georgia is continuing in exactly the same way. When EU money is spent on funding extremists - as I have seen, this person is the author of fascist chants - when the authors of fascist slogans are funded with EU money, this is encouragement of extremism, radicalism and fascism in Georgia”, he said.

Papuashvili further argued that the use of European funds for such purposes reflected what he called a “civilisational gap” between the United States and the European Union.

“We see that Europeans’ money is being used in Georgia to fund people or groups with fascist ideology. This is the civilisational gap that the United States is talking to the European Union about - that, simply to achieve your political objective in another country, you are ready to fund extremists, radicals and promoters of fascist ideologies”, the Speaker continued.

Papuashvili said he did not expect European officials to respond to the issue, claiming that Brussels was pursuing an agenda aimed at destabilising Georgia.

He referred to what he described as a European Commission spokesperson’s support for the events of October 4 and alleged that European actors had shown little concern about the possibility of bloodshed in Georgia.

“We should accept this as a fact. I do not expect anyone to respond to this issue, because Brussels is not interested in the position of the Georgian people. They have a defined agenda - destabilising Georgia, which we saw in the support for October 4 from the Commission spokesperson. So they are following this plan. They do not care what happens here, just as they did not care about October 4, when we narrowly avoided bloodshed”, he noted.

Papuashvili concluded by alleging that European funds were being channelled through organisations to support what he described as extremism, radicalism and the promotion of fascist ideology in Georgia.