Tbilisi mayor calls EU threats to cancel visa-free regime with Georgia blackmail
The European Union's threats to cancel visa-free regime for Georgia are usual blackmail, Tbilisi Mayor Kakha Kaladze told reporters on September 23.
"This is the usual blackmail I was talking about," Georgian First Channel quoted him as saying.
According to Kaladze, the topic of abolishing visa liberalization will be heard more actively as parliamentary elections are approaching in the country. At the same time realization of such measures is a complicated bureaucratic procedure, the politician noted.
Earlier, on September 17, the Georgian parliament banned the propaganda of sex change and LGBT (the movement is banned in Russia, the activities of the organization recognized as extremist). Then EU diplomacy chief Josep Borrell said that the law further detracted the country from joining the association and called for its repeal. The Politico newspaper reported on September 19 that Brussels is considering revoking the 2017 agreement, which gives Georgian citizens the right to visit the association for up to six months a year.
Georgia's relations with the U.S. and the EU have been strained since the adoption of the foreign agents law in May. Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili vetoed it, but MPs overrode it. The law came into force on June 3. Borrel said at the time that its adoption would have a negative impact on Georgia's EU integration process.
After that, the US imposed visa sanctions on dozens of Georgian citizens and expressed readiness to expand the restrictions. In response, Kaladze said that no one in the country is afraid of the U.S. sanctions, while Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze called them insulting.
