The state of the resistence in Georgia, with Nino Kalandadze

In this episode of the Liberal Europe Podcast, Ricardo Silvestre (Movimento Liberal Social), welcomes back Amb. Nino Kalandadze, founder and executive director of the Chavchavadze Center in Tbilisi, Georgia. They talk about the situation on the country, the courage of Georgians fighting for a better future, and what we can all do to help. 

This podcast is produced by the European Liberal Forum in collaboration with Movimento Liberal Social and Fundacja Liberté!, with the financial support of the European Parliament. Neither the European Parliament nor the European Liberal Forum are responsible for the content or for any use that be made of.

Show notes

This podcast, as well as previous episodes, is available on SoundCloud, Apple Podcast, Stitcher and Spotify.

You can learn more about Nino here and follow her on LinkedIn.

Get to know the work done by the Chavchavadze Center, the first civil society organisation in Georgia modelled after European political foundations, here. You can also follow them on Facebook, and Instagram.

Transcript

Welcome to the Liberal Europe podcast. I’m your host, Ricardo Silvestre, and thank you so much for listening to today’s episode. And today it is an honor to have back on the podcast Ambassador Nino Kalandadze.

She’s a founder and executive director of the Chavchavadze Center, also former deputy minister of foreign affairs of Georgia that led the EU-Georgia talks in 2008. We had her on an episode on the 14th of November to talk about the importance of supporting Georgia’s civil society, and this was before the election. Well, unfortunately, things have not gotten any better since then.

In fact, the brave women and men from Georgia are in the streets of the country protesting nonstop since the 28th of October against the election fraud, the arrest and violence against protesters, the laws that the government is trying to pass to curtail civil society and people’s freedom, and the will of the government to go against a majority of Georgians regarding the future of the country, particularly the relationship with the European Union and with NATO.

Our friends in Georgia need all the help we can provide, and Ambassador Kalandadze explains what is the situation on the ground and what needs to be done to have a significant change. And after our main conversation, please stay to hear a little more about the brave work that not only Ambassador does, but all the team at Chavchavadze Center and all the brave men and women fighting for a better future and a better country of Georgia.

But now, with no further ado, it’s my honor and privilege to bring you back to the podcast Ambassador Nino Kalandzdze. I’m here with Nino Kalandadze. Nino, thank you so much for coming back to the podcast.

Thank you for the invitation and for keeping Georgia in your thoughts and on your audience’s radar.

We’re going to talk about several key issues relating to naturally the situation in Georgia. But first, I’m going to ask you, how are you doing?

The feeling is, we are all overwhelmed with mixed feelings, but it’s a point where none of us can plan anything. We have some ongoing projects that are being prepared now, but nothing really meaningful happens because it’s all in a pending mode. We are witnessing some political court processes and we just wait for what’s going to happen. But at the same time, we’re not particularly hopeful that anything might happen anytime soon because, obviously, of the internal power imbalance, but also because of the external factors that contributed to that and the indecisiveness on the European side and somewhat strange attitude coming from D.C.

Yes, we’re going to touch on that pretty soon.

But still on what we’re seeing in the streets of Tbilisi, and not only there’s been multiple rallies around the country, people still are in the streets, people are still protesting, people are still waving the flags of the European Union and of Georgia together. The repression is not enough to change this, at least from the outside, that’s what we see every day, day after day after day, people in the streets. How sustainable is this?

Well, that’s the question, because that’s also the challenge. Just two days ago, we marked the 34th anniversary of Georgia’s independence referendum and 99% of Georgians voted to break free from 70 years of Soviet Russian occupation, paradoxically, but not surprisingly, obviously, 34 years later, Georgia stands at another crossroads, at risk of losing its independence and sovereignty, and once again falling under Russian control. For over three months now, protests have raged against the regime with demonstrators demanding new elections, yet no meaningful change has occurred. The Russian-backed government, which seized power through massively falsified elections and brutally suppressed peaceful demonstrators, is now tightening its grip, pushing the country towards a full-fledged autocracy.

While it has not managed so far to gain international legitimacy, it continues to target all political opposition, civil society, the independent media. Just yesterday, the Parliamentary Committee, Economic Committee, approved a draft law that bans broadcasters from receiving foreign funding. The regime tries now to buy time and operates under the assumption that Western actors will eventually be forced to negotiate with them, particularly betting on President Trump, hoping Washington’s leniency toward Putin will ultimately benefit Georgia’s domestic oligarch as well.

But the balance of power internally is overwhelmingly disproportionate, and that’s a major challenge. On the one side, there is the entire state apparatus, which is backed by vast financial and administrative resources, widely believed to be directly supported by Russian intelligence services, which provide logistical, financial, and propaganda assistance. On the other side, there are unarmed citizens fighting with their bare hands, with no institutional protection whatsoever.

Now, since this is not a democratic setting or democratic regime, it is immune to conventional pressure and continues following the Russian playbook, passing laws that restrict civil society, independent media, and all progress and political forces, despite ongoing protests. At the same time, a parallel effort is underway, a so-called Parliamentary Investigative Commission that they have initiated, resembling a classic Kremlin Soviet-era tactics. It is trying to rewrite history.

Its primary goal is not to criminalize pro-Western political forces and ultimately ban them constitutionally. More broadly, it seeks to discredit Georgia’s most successful years and punish in an exemplary manner the political force, the country, obviously, and its people for daring to have ever turned West and proving that Georgia cannot survive and develop without Russian dominance. Just two days ago, the commission went further, indicating plans to blame former presidents and, by extension, Georgia for the war in 2008.

This is a very dangerous precedent. This is an absurdly false accusation, repeatedly disproven by international courts, but relentlessly and so far unsuccessfully pushed by Moscow for years. Now, obviously, given Russia’s 2014 invasion and then the full-scale war launched three years ago against Ukraine, there is no doubt who the aggressor was in 2008.

This narrative is dictated directly by Moscow, an attempt to rewrite history, punish pro-Western leadership in the region, discourage others from breaking away from Russia, which could be a good example. For example, Armenia, and most dangerously, prepare the ground for recognizing Georgia’s occupied territories as an independent state, a move that would have disastrous long-term consequences. Whether Georgia prevails depends on several key factors, like Trump’s proposed peace mediation in Ukraine and how successful it might be, the outcome of the war in Ukraine and the conditions with which it will end, the extent to which Europe and Washington can remain committed to Georgia, given all the challenges they face domestically, Europe’s ability to consolidate its position both internally and in the region.

At its core, this is a battle over, let’s say, over what kind of governance will prevail in Georgia. Due to the growing importance of the Trans-Caspian international transit route and the Middle Corridor, authoritarian powers like Russia and China need Georgia to be an autocracy, free from transparency and regulatory constraints that come with democracy. Now, Europe, and hopefully the United States as well, need Georgia to remain a democracy, one where economic development follows international norms and is secured by the rules-based global order.

So, in simple terms, this is a contest over who will control this critical corridor and under what system of governance. Even though Georgia is not currently Washington’s top priority, its geographic position and role as a secure transit route still may get strategically important, and that’s what we all hope. When it comes to overcoming current challenges, the timing is pretty crucial for the democratic movement to survive.

Western partners must act in accordance with their statements, further isolating the illegitimate regime, increasing pressure as far as they can, and making it clear that Georgian Dream, as an illegitimate entity, is not a partner for negotiations. The opposition is very weak and fragmented, lacks the leverage to engage effectively with Washington’s new administration, so external European actors, if possible, could push for swift implementation of the announced sanctions. But again, the timing matters.

The battle for Georgia’s future hangs on whether the pro-democracy movement can sustain its momentum. Meanwhile, Ivanishvili will try to stall, weaken the movement, and strengthen his bargaining position in international negotiations. So this is a power struggle, and victory depends on how quickly the West consolidates its commitment to the region, again, rejecting engagement with an illegitimate regime, keeping it isolated, applying maximum pressure to push for new elections.

But this must happen fast, before the people’s ability to resist is exhausted, an increasing challenge given the immense pressure and power imbalance. So this is where we stand now, and that’s a major challenge that we need to overcome. Keep the resistance despite the internal pressure, and hope that the international community can engage in some kind of negotiations soon.

Let’s stay there, Nino, because there are movements. There was a motion for a resolution on the European Parliament. There’s also what is called the Megobary Act, that actually a couple of days ago was approved by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. And there’s also a sister bill at the House of Representatives, that one unfortunately still on committee. But there is this call, which is both at the European Union level, and then at this more Congress-centered initiative, we don’t see it on a Trump administration, you’re right about that. But there is this request, which is for sanctions, to suspend financial aid, to stop, for example, diplomatic visas to be issued.

This, clearly, it’s not enough right now. It looks that way, and for what you just said, and that there’s the urgency of it. So if you would have power of make something happen really quickly, what could be done?

Yeah, you’re right. This is not enough, and it has an explanation why. Because the Ivanishvili regime now widely, and I believe rightfully assumed, is a Russian entity. It’s basically an occupying force now sitting in Tbilisi.

They are prepared for pretty much everything that is coming now, because once they initiated the foreign agents law at the initial stage, they then tactically stepped back because they were not ready to address the pressure coming from external actors. Now they have consolidated their power, but also their, I don’t know, financial corrupt resources, so that they can be pretty resistant to a certain extent. What matters now is that, I mean, Ivanishvili, this Russian billionaire, is not just one person, right? To maintain dictatorship, he needs the so-called enablers of the system, which is business elites, political elites that need to be nourished, pushing quickly and effectively for further sanctions, not just verbally, not just suspending diplomatic visas, but actually targeting their financial assets, will weaken those enablers that make it possible that the system prevails in a way it does currently.

Because someone needs to shape that system that would weaken the regime and simultaneously empower the democratic movement. Because again, this is a chain of power. The institutions are kept together through corruption and through an illegitimate system of governance.

Now, if, for example, the courts or the law enforcement agencies see the weakness, but also a danger that they might be directly affected by financial sanctions, then they might think twice before they go and disperse the rally and capture peaceful demonstrators. This is just a logical understanding. It does not mean this is a recipe for success because we’ve seen examples in Belarus, and we’ve seen examples in Russia.

In Belarus, people were standing outside for four months, and ultimately nothing happened. Nothing good happened. Everybody had to migrate, whoever stayed got imprisoned or were eliminated.

So this is the scenario we are facing. But again, Georgia is in as much different from, let’s say, our neighboring authoritarian countries like Azerbaijan or like Belarus, that its economy is not self-sustainable or self-sufficient. So it’s still, in the long run, it is dependent on outside resources.

And this is the idea everybody on the democratic side has been pushing for. What we can do internally is keep resisting as long as we can, but we also need to get strengthened from outside. And under we, I mean everybody who is standing outside demanding new elections and demanding changing the policies back to the pro-European track.

Absolutely. For people like us, political scientists, it’s so depressing to think that there’s values like ethics, morals, love of humanity, friendship and all that, but it all comes down to money. If you cut the money spigot, that’s how we have changed.

Yeah, in autocratism, that’s what matters. Perhaps some autocratic rulers, which I not necessarily believe, but might have also some ideology behind them or some vision. But the people or the resources, they keep their autocracies and they keep their way of governing. They are interconnected. The only thing that keeps them together is money.  And Ivanishvili is somebody who came to power only because he had a lot of money. Nothing else. No ideology, no political vision, nothing. It was just money.

All right, let’s talk about now more personally. And that is, we have the institutions we already mentioned, European Parliament, European Commission, U.S. Senate, U.S. House of Representatives. There are people caring about Georgia and trying to make something happen not as fast as we would like and we would need, as you mentioned. What can individual people do? What can people in the European Union, or I know that there are people listening to us in the United States, what can we individually, people that care about Georgia and the future of the people there, what can we do to help?

Indeed, there are a lot of people, both institutionally and on a personal level, who do care about Georgia and this goes beyond the strategic interests Europe has towards the region. I think, most importantly, staying focused on Georgia because, I mean, things can happen quickly.

With all the challenges Europe faces now, Georgia might easily move towards a less interesting or to a lesser priority than other things are. So my request would be, keep focus on Georgia, keep Georgia in mind, and as far as our friends like you, journalists or whoever publishes on Georgia and has a say, that they just keep talking about Georgia’s cause so that the challenge is there and we remain visible to the world.

So, stay focused on Georgia, take it seriously, promote the building then of this new coalition that is more aware of the dangers of Russian influence in Georgia or in Armenia, as you said, or, for example, in Belarus, Ukraine. Give us a couple more examples. What can people individually do?

Again, not giving up on Georgia, understanding a long-term war and be prepared for it. Again, consolidating power is one thing and sustaining a dictatorship in a country like Georgia is another thing.

Empower civil society as far as they can. The options have been limited to legislatively for civil society so that they can no longer receive any Western funds. But I’m sure there are other possibilities to support the civil society.

I mean, again, we’re very, very endangered in the sense that many of us will have to leave the country, as it happened already once in the 90s, and as it happened in Belarus, in Russia and in many countries who have fallen back to authoritarian regime. So we will have, we will need all support of our partners to survive this bad or dark period that may be launched now for an indefinite time. But a lot will depend on how quickly and with what results and with what terms the war in Ukraine will come to an end.

And then it will give us more options to readdress Georgia again and see how one can keep Georgia outside of the contemporary Iron Curtain that Putin is now putting down.

So I’m going to do a call, which is rare for my listeners. Please get involved.Please engage. Please help our Georgian friends. Your struggle is our struggle. Your future is our future. Nino, I have the highest respect and admiration for you, for all the people that I met when I was there and all the people that I will be meeting in the near future in this struggle, which is a European struggle. So stay safe, stay strong, stay connected. I’ve been talking with Nino Kalandadze, she’s the director of the Chavchavadze Center and all around a wonderful person. Thank you so much for your time.

Thank you so much for your support, for your interest and for your dedication to our cause. And I do hope to stay in touch.

You mentioned empowering civil society.

You are the director of the Chavchavadze Center. You do an amazing work there. You have a publication called New Iberia. So tell our people, and then naturally I’m going to put all the links on the podcast show notes, but tell them, our listeners, how we can get involved more directly. Apart from all this that we just mentioned a minute ago, which is to work with our politicians, with our governments, with our journalists, with our intellectuals, but also we can do it directly, like, for example, supporting your center.

Our center is pretty young in a sense that it was founded in 2018, but it has become very impactful because it does a lot of good work that benefits a lot of beneficiaries in Georgia. It is the first civil society organization in Georgia that is modeled after European political foundations. It operates as a think and do tank with extensive face-to-face activities, as well as practical research studies and publications. We pursue three major fundamental directions.

This is civic and political education. We provide training sessions, or used to provide training sessions, public lectures, debate trainings, public speaking courses, media literacy workshops, particularly in the regions with limited access to informal education. Then there is memory and identity, civic memory and identity, a particular affront to Georgian dream as we counter the misinformation and historical revisionism while promoting democratic Europe as part of Georgia’s identity.

Then, to a certain extent, as a political foundation, we work with political parties on the political party development. We focus on promoting internal party democracy using a bottom-up approach, creating demand for democratic practices from within the parties. Additionally, obviously, we counter propaganda and disinformation.

Georgia has been a testing ground for Russian hybrid warfare, not only militarily, but also through misinformation tactics that are later applied against the West. Our analytical work, as you mentioned, is something we take pride in, particularly our bilingual sociopolitical analytical magazine, which features brilliant contributors and is gaining popularity. I hope we can continue publishing it because it is a journal that can be done remotely.

It has very committed authors, and it is supported by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation in the German foreign ministry. This is something we hope to continue in any case. Our general goal is to cultivate a critical mass of Georgian citizens who understand democracy, recognize its responsibilities, practice good citizenship, and value European principles.

We strive to build a society that understands EU membership, entails obligations as well as benefits, recognizes and can depict and understand propaganda and how it works, and appreciates historical context to avoid repeating past mistakes. Every day we meet our alumni in the streets, in political parties and the media, well informed individuals fighting for Georgia’s democratic future, which makes us believe that we also have contributed to this transformation to a certain extent. However, again, our future remains pretty uncertain due to the new agent law, but now rephrased into FARA, which is even stronger.

And the ruling party’s hostile stance towards civil society organizations, particularly towards our organization. Again, nevertheless, we continue to hope for the Foundation’s support so that by 2030 we can achieve what we and our European partners have worked so hard for.

This is all for now.

I’ll be back soon with more podcasts. You can always visit the website liberalforum.eu to know more about the activities of the European Liberal Forum. So until the next episode, let’s keep making the world a better place.