David Zedelashvili @DZedelashvili Twitter profile

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

🧵 There are too many armchair experts, who do not know a thing about Georgia but are arrogant and condescending enough to lecture us that Ivanishvili regime has nothing to do with Russia. Would you give us a break from your nonsense ? /1

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

This is excellent, comprehensive coverage of Georgian society’s ongoing battle. The kind of coverage that is regrettably still missing beyond Europe, most notably in the US media.

Channel 4 News

@Channel4News

5 months

Crowds of protesters have gathered again in Georgia's capital, after police broke up demonstrations outside the parliament building. @paraicobrien is in Tbilisi.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Russia’s puppet regime should fall

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

🧵Georgia and Belarus: Anticipated Mass Repression and the Limits of Comparative Autocratization. The trajectory of Georgian Dream Regime in GE has recently taken drastic turns. Facing spontaneous, youth-dominated mass protest mobilization /1

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

The minimal price of freedom under Russia’s puppet authoritarian regime is tear gas, pepper spray and water cannons. The regime rises the stakes daily. P.S. Filtered tear gas smells terrible too.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

When I say that unleashing of mass scale violent repression is imminent by the Georgian regime, I mean this. It has already become systematic and widespread.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Next time you make bold assertions about Ivanishvili regime and his supposed autonomy from the Kremlin, do your homework better and study the evidence that amply contradict your conclusions. /END

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

#Tbilisiprotests This is huge spontaneous mobilization. Metekhi bridge and squares on its both embankments is packed. All streets leading to it are full. The people have formed a sovereign body and took public spaces. The only legitimate power in Georgia stands here.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

This is the only true sovereign in GE. Faceless dictatorship stinks as a lie through and through.

Mtavari TV

@MtavariChannel

5 months

Tbilisi 🇬🇪🇪🇺❤️ #Georgia #NoToRussianLaw

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

This is the true movement, from the deep roots of #Georgian society. This movement stands for Georgia’s European identity and sovereign selfhood. Neither puppet regime nor its #Russian imperial masters can beat the movement.

Katie Shoshiashvili

@KShoshiashvili

6 months

#Tbilisi

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Do you know a thing about Georgian politics? Its constitutional system and political regime? And their interplay? Have you studied Ivanishvili regime, his playbook, the trajectory of state capture and social cooptation? /2

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Do you know that RU’s, Belarus’ and Ivanishvili’s intelligence and internal security officials are having joint trainings, including in GE? Do you know that GE state security service even formalized its ties with Belarusian counterpart ? /6

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Do you have a slightest idea what are the networks that make up Ivanishvili’s power in Georgia ? Have you studied the deep ties of these networks to Putin regime? Do you know who is Otar Phartshkaladze and why is he sanctioned by the US? /3

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

🧵 The Ivanishvili regime MP has disclosed President’s veto message. There is a procedural restriction on veto power by the Parliament’s rules of procedure. The presidential veto should be presented in a form of an alternative bill. /1

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Do you know about the close cooperation of Ivanishvili’s political police with Russian special services? Have you read investigative report establishing that the son of GRU s foreign sabotage chief had free pass in GE to conduct operations against foreign diplomats ? /5

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Do you know what Phartskahaladze does for Ivanishvili in GE and in RU? Do you know RU oligarch Yevtushenkov and Ivanishvili’s ties with him? Do you know how many of Yevtushenkov’s associates have directly interfered in GE through RU hybrid operations benefiting Ivanishvili? /4

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

🧵 Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili’s address showed clarity on the nature and ends of the regime unusual for her previous record. She stated that throughout the veto procedure she will not help the regime in cosmetic manipulations to save the regime’s face. /1

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

🧵 As expected, considering its overall trajectory, the Ivanishvili regime responded to the first package of the US sanctions with more escalation and insult. The regime remains undeterred, and it will undoubtedly override the presidential veto, /1

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

🧵Bidzina Ivanishvili has delivered comprehensive anti-western political manifesto. His regime now clearly identifies the West as an external enemy and GE civil society as enemy within, whom he promises to conclusively repress after 2024 elections. /1

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Ivanishvili regime is reassuring its elites on US sanctions, betting on the Trump win in November. Disregarding the fact that sanctions legislation against them is sponsored also by the Trump loyalists in Congress. I suppose this is just a bait for the regime’s lower elites.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

The comparison with Belarus becomes appropriate for several reasons. Firstly, it is Ivanishvili’s and Lukashenka’s choice to cling to power by means of mass violent repression. And more importantly, their shared external patron power- Kremlin regime of Vladimir Putin. /3

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Venice Commission delivered a definitive blow. Not only did it reduce Ivanishvili regime’s abusive, half baked “arguments” to dust, but also issued a damning indictment of the regime’s manifest betrayal of the Rule of Law and ALL other values of Const. democracy.

Venice Commission

@VeniceComm

5 months

#Georgia - Urgent Opinion on the Law of Georgia on Transparency of Foreign Influence

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Long 🧵 Venice Commission's opinion on Georgia's Foreign Agents' Bill and its domestic and European constitutional implications for Georgia. The opinion is a comprehensive rebuttal of the bill and all thinly veiled abusive justifications asserted by the GE regime. /1

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

My appearance on @SkyNews on Foreign agents’ legislation and the objectives of GE regime. I had to trim the video to fit in X’s restrictions.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

the regime, headed by the Russian oligarch Bidzina Ivanishvili is tightening the screws and intensifying violent repression. Regime’s updated playbook and clarified trajectory towards a closed authoritarian regime, invites parallels with the similar regimes. /2

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

However, it remains a possibility that protest mobilization and resolve reaches the magnitude that Ivanishvili’s security forces get overwhelmed and the extent of RU assistance is not sufficient to compensate it. /END

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Talked to BBC Newsnight from the protest. A bit more emotional performance than usual from me, but the message is clear. #Georgiaprotests

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

/1. On Georgia’s Independence Day, my mood is far from festive. Our sovereignty is captured by a hostile force- Russian imperialism, through its occupying army and puppet authoritarian regime. The regime is hurriedly completing the tasks set by its imperial masters-

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

This makes internal funding unavailable for civil causes, but external funding has remained open until now, providing lifeline to GE civil society. That’s why the regime targets it now through foreign agent legislation. /8

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

This is a high class legal trolling from the President, of the regime which functions through cheating on rule of law and autocratic legalism. The regime seems offended. It now has two paths of retreat and one path of escalation. No middle way, no strategic ambiguity. /3

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

In contrast, Georgia has been illiberal democracy: civil society, media and opposition had experienced targeted repression and harassment, however they remained institutionalized and relatively organized. /6

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Dear policymakers in Washington DC. Good occasion to take note that you are dealing with a deeply deranged man, believing in lunatic conspiracies and like his patron, Russia, acting thuggishly to extort what he considers his “own”, which actually is not his at all.

Formula NEWS | English

@FormulaGe

5 months

Georgian PM Irakli Kobakhidze said today Georgian Dream honorary chair Bidzina Ivanishvili has refused to meet with foreign diplomats, because "under blackmail, he cannot hold any meeting." He specifically claimed the fact that Mr Ivanishvili’s two billion USD have been seized by

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

🧵I get that many leftists and left leaning academics globally are suspicious about the democracy promotion paradigm, see NGO’s as part of it and hold more doubts regarding their role. However, if these commitments make them ignore facts about authoritarian regime, /1

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Let’s start with the caveats: a) Under Lukashenka Belarus has been subject to authoritarian rule for three decades. Civil society organizations and opposition were systemically repressed. Many of them faced legal obstacles to operate, were dissolved or otherwise made illegal. /5

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

b) Belarus’s economy is state dominated, making internal sources of civil society funding unavailable and external funding is also cut off. In Georgia, the economy is nominally market based, but in reality, it is cartelized by the regime. /7

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

d) Compared to Belarusian army, GE army has been trained for NATO led military operations and to the available knowledge is NOT trained for internal protest suppression tasks, making its classic authoritarian use for mass protest suppression less likely. /12

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

To satisfy this procedural requirement and at the same time stick to her position that the law should be immediately repealed, the President’s alternative bill added a self-destruction timer: the law should expire after one day upon entering force. /2

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

🧵President Zourabichvili gave the regime simple choice: not overturning her veto by voting down the original version of the bill adopted by three readings. She refused to take part in regime’s autocratic legal chicanery. However, I do not expect regime’s tactical retreat. /1

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

4 months

Imposing visa restrictions on the members of Ivanishvili’s regime. More to be followed. This is the right policy and it should be consistently expanded to strangle the regime.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

At least till the Russian law comes to force, GE civil society has resources to remain institutionally viable. /9

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Important to understand: 1. GE regime willfully pursues isolationism from the West. 2. The regime will not respond to Western soft power. It does not care anymore. 3. Hard measures, like sanctions are undesirable for the regime, but won’t be deterred only by them.

Formula NEWS | English

@FormulaGe

5 months

"Several countries, mainly the Baltic states, Germany as well as Poland, the Czech Republic, if I'm not mistaken, the chairmen of the Foreign Relations Committees expressed their desire to visit, and among them, there was a desire to meet with me. I told them that it was not a

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

It is up to the regime which path it takes. My guess is the escalation, the override and post entry into force attempts to sell the autocratic legalist facade building in exchange of sanction avoidance. This should be resisted and prevented. /END

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

However, as elsewhere in comparative analysis, contextual caveats make broad generalizations less convincing. There are such contextual considerations in Georgia-Belarus comparison too. However, there still remain good reasons to retain Belarus as a useful comparator. /4

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Lukashenka, in contrast, has used army units in protest crackdown. Now let’s get back to the common ground. Ivanishvili has been modeling his political police and security services to those of Belarus and Russia. /13

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

c) Another caveat comes from the absence of violent mass repression in Georgia until recently. Lukashenka’s use of repression usually went beyond the targeted and calculated repression paradigm. /10

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

As a result, by the time of 2020 crackdown, Belarus’ society had already undergone massive authoritarian engineering efforts, had been considerably atomized and demobilized. This is not yet the case in GE. /11

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

His police and internal security services are well trained, well paid and extremely loyal to the regime and the leader. They know they are shielded from all responsibilty while regime is in place /14

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

and the more criminal acts they commit in repressing citizenry, the higher are their personal stakes in regime collapse. Classic authoritarian model of ensuring the loyal security agencies. /15

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

The West should consider that like in Belarus, Georgian civil society faces imminent violent crackdown. Many will go to prison for lengthy terms, others will be victims of enforced disappearances and assassination by the regime squads. The rest will be exiled. /END

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

If the regime votes for the president’s alternative bill, the Russian law will expire in a day. The regime could also retreat by voting down the original bill after voting down the president’s bill. Or it can escalate and vote for the original version of the bill. /4

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Ivanishvili’s internal security machine is also coup proof. The repressive apparatus is split into Ministry of Internal Affairs and State Security Service agencies and outsourced to private security firms and various thugs for hire groups. /16

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

However, the shock of mass scale violent repression, including mass torture, imprisonment and use of lethal force could help the GE regime to subdue and manage the protest mobilization and achieve its autocratization objectives. /22

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Loyal security forces, ready to follow any order from the leader and help from greater autocratic power- RU could be decisive factors here. In this scenario, Belarusian model will be successfully transplanted in GE. /23

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

but it still could help the GE puppet regime with spetsnaz units and sabotage groups. To sum up. Georgian civil society has more infrastructural power than Belarusians had for mobilization. /21

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

None of them enjoys primacy and they compete for power and spoils, which makes them easier for Ivanishvili to control. Well disciplined, loyal, coup and defection proof security agencies, are huge asset for enforcing successful mass scale violent repression. /17

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Ivanishvili’s security personnel will do the same. They have never betrayed the leader before and have less personal motives to do so in the future. And last but not least. Strong backing by external patron-Russia. /19

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

In this respect Ivanishvili’s and Lukashenka’s security forces are very much alike. When Lukashenka’s security official ordered his men to shoot protesters in face and use lethal force, at the command of the leader, they complied unconditionally. /18

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

3 months

1/ Bidzina Ivanishvili's speech today once again reiterated in the clearest terms that he believes in Russia's victory. He estimates that Russian victory will take a year at most. He believes that Trump's victory will accelerate this process and Russians may win already

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

For RU trolls who demand judicially ascertainable evidence. That will follow too once the regime is out but for now the circumstantial evidence overwhelmingly supports the point here. That’s why your owners are angry. And make you spill digital blood.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

It is expected that Russia will provide robust support in enforcing violent mass crackdown to Ivanishvili, like it did to Lukashenka. Due to its war of aggression in Ukraine, RU might be lacking army troops for Georgia intervention, /20

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Regime’s special forces are ready. My fear is that #Russian GRU foreign sabotage group fighters will bolster the #Georgian puppet regime forces if they get overwhelmed.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Her today’s speech is welcome development and she deserves praise for it. /END

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Sanctions should target the regime's repression apparatus and repressive capabilities, degrade and undermine them. Unless the regime's collapse is triggered due to defection and exhaustion, the repression will succeed. /END

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Georgian mass protest movement still has to secure a single win against the regime on its terms. Next week is the key period. Whether the regime bulldozes his way through the protest of this magnitude or gets obstructed will have consequences.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Nothing unexpected. His regime has been traveling this path from the start. Only those who were blinded by either wishful thinking or complicity could not see. And here we come. Ivanishvili’s Yanukovich moment arrived at last and he made the turn. /2

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

This requires immediate policy change towards Georgia from the West. The working assumption should be that they are not dealing with even someone like Vucic, but more like Lukashenka. Worse even, Lukashenka has more autonomy from the Kremlin than Ivanishvili does. /3

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

This is the same language of appeasement that brought us here. The regime has no “legitimate” concerns. It only has sinister interests of personalist dictator. It has no legitimacy. It is an illegitimate instrument of the Kremlin undermining Georgian people.

Charles Michel

@CharlesMichel

5 months

Discussed the current situation in Georgia today with 🇬🇪 President @Zourabichvili_S over the phone, followed by a call with 🇬🇪PM @PM_Kobakhidze . Reiterated my full support in continuing to help Georgians to work towards a European future, including by helping to find the best

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

The President also clearly stated that the problem lies in the Russian nature of the regime itself, and the Russian laws are only manifestations of this. In the past, I have been consistently critical of the President for helping the regime in maintaining strategic ambiguity. /4

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Georgian regime has just alienated the last EU bureaucrat still talking to them with some empathy.

Rikard Jozwiak

@RikardJozwiak

5 months

Enlargement commission Varhelyi: “I regret that one part of my phone call was not just fully taken out of context but was also presented to the public in a way which could give rise to a complete misinterpretation of the originally intended aim of my phone call.” 🇬🇪

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Western policy should quickly assume the full features of what is now presented in Congress. Georgia's society will need this support to resist violent repression. /5

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

Regime in Tbilisi has effectively terminated strategic partnership with the US. For dummies here, let’s ask, which regional state power benefits from this most?

Civil.ge

@CivilGe

6 months

#US Ambassador Robin #Dunnigan says in her statement that senior members of #Georgian Government refused to engage directly "with most senior leaders in US" to discuss strategic partnership and any concerns with U.S. assistance

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

And yes, for policy making circumstantial evidence is sufficient. I’m not making a case for Ivanishvili ‘s legal responsibility for treason, not yet and not here- beyond the reasonable doubt evidence is needed only for this. You can’t blur the lines, even with propaganda skill.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

4 months

Visa restrictions on Ivanishvili regime should be promptly extended and augmented by financial sanctions. The regime’s patrons have already made preparations for sanction-proofing. The full force of sanctions should come before sanction-proofing and regime closure are complete.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

These kids are not Hamas. Hamas may use them as shields, but they have no choice over it, they don’t have means to resist. Their lives should be saved.

Bruno Maçães

@MacaesBruno

5 months

The children of Rafah

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Russia's objective, then, is to complete Georgia's Belarusization project. Ivanishvili will have full-fledged Russian support in this undertaking, which will require a hitherto unseen scale of violent repression. /4

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Ivanishvili regime MP, linking “global party of war” conspiracy to freemasonry. Dumb, unimaginative, thoughtless, like her patron. Even reddit threads are more sophisticated than these.

The News Agents

@TheNewsAgents

5 months

"Freemasons have an influence on politics, on everything..." 🕵️ In Tbilisi @lewis_goodall spoke to an MP from the governing Georgian Dream party. Its leader, the Prime Minister, blames the country's ills on 'the global war party' - a mysterious, multinational organisation. 🇬🇪

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

In retrospect, it becomes evident that this is the outcome the Ivanishvili regime and its foreign patrons—Russia and China—have always sought. The isolated Ivanishvili regime will become a vassal entity between Russia and China. /3

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

enacting the Russian foreign agents' law. With the US Congress adopting Georgia sanctions legislation and the EU implementing its first response in the form of sanctions, the Ivanishvili regime's complete and irreversible estrangement from the West is imminent. /2

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Ivanishvili needs this deceptive face saving to once again create strategic ambiguity and avoid/delay Western sanctions. To finalize his declared goals of authoritarian consolidation and Georgia’s isolation from the West uninterrupted. /2

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

7 months

#Alert #Scholaratrisk A thread. I’m a constitutional scholar and commentator on public affairs from #Georgia . I have become the target of coordinated personal attacks and smear campaign by the #Georgianregime . Digital privacy of my family and me was infringed. 1/10

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Ivanishvili's regime in Georgia has signed Russian foreign agents’ legislation into law. At this point, only a successful civil disobedience campaign defying the Russian law, backed by mass protests, could undermine the regime and lead to its eventual collapse.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

No illiberal or autocratic actor in Europe has ever been this cheap to European institutions. Even Putin followed some diplomatic conventions. His minions in Tbilisi are unleashed and unstoppable. Kobakhidze is like a chimp throwing around feces joyfully.

Civil.ge

@CivilGe

5 months

PM Kobakhidze brushed aside the @VeniceComm 's damning conclusion regarding the foreign agent's law, saying it contains "completely absurd legal judgment without any argumentation." He argued that today, "our country is sovereign as never before" and can see the truth.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

2 years

@k_sonin @vkaramurza @Billbrowder Podoprigorov is still on the treasury sanctions list. He petitioned in 2018 through the said law firm. Not successfully it appears.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Totalirarian practices of this magnitude could possibly have only one chief sponsor- Russia.

Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project

@OCCRP

5 months

UPDATE: The editor of our member center @studiomonitori woke up Friday to find her car covered with insulting phrases including "agent sold for money." Journalists & activists in Georgia are under threat amid protests over a proposed foreign agent law.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

In this opinion piece, I trace the Russian origins, trajectory and destination of the Georgian Dream regime. Georgian Dream was built on a known lie and once it expired, the regime took a predictable turn towards full authoritarianism, just like in Russia.

The Moscow Times

@MoscowTimes

5 months

#OpEd The violent crackdown against protests against the “Russian law” is the latest manifestation of Georgian Dream’s authoritarian project. @DZedelashvili explains how the party tightened its grip over Georgia.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

4 months

Narratives that the Georgian Dream’s pivot toward Russia is not what it appears to be emerging every other day. Presenting Ivanishvili and his regime as largely autonomous actors who align themselves with Russia for pragmatic reasons of survival and driven by the perception /1

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

6 months

If you want to get updates of the latest developments on the ground, follow my wife. She’s been out from the field for a while and reclaimed the profession of a reporter for the occasion of these historic events.

Anna Gvarishvili

@AnnaGvarishvili

6 months

“Me var Sakartvelo” (I’m Georgia) 🇬🇪 #TbilisiProtests

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Western actors shall not allow the regime to fool them. They should not accept any compromise from the regime that is other than complete repeal of the Russian foreign agents law. /END

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

🧵 The Venice Commission’s urgent opinion on the Georgian foreign agents’ legislation to be published next week. Hopefully, it will be as clear and as categorical as in similar opinions, demanding that the law’s complete withdrawal is the ONLY option /1

Venice Commission

@VeniceComm

6 months

#GEORGIA - forthcoming urgent joint opinion – online meetings

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

which is sponsored by imperialist power like RU and an ongoing authoritarian crackdown and consolidation, I doubt the bona fide nature of their stances. Denial of RU imperialism where it is manifest, simply because that does not fit your picture of Western imperialism’s evils /2

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

is dishonest and morally wrong. It seems they are not against imperialism as such, but only against the specific powers of their dislike, as they conveniently ignore the evils of their preferred imperialist power. /3

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

As I said on BBC, the Rule of Law is a thing that this regime hates most. Now with its rapid descent to autocracy, the regime switches from the abuse of ROL to its manifest violation. As expected, it makes the Russian foreign agents’ law more repressive day by day.

Civil.ge

@CivilGe

5 months

It came to light that the final version of the #ForeignAgentsLaw now fines individuals for not disclosing data on suspected agents under "foreign influence," while the initial draft only penalized organizations

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

@derspiegel ‘s extensive piece on the repression of civil society in GE. With my comments on the return of Stalinist technique’s in GE regime’s repressive menu.

(S+) Georgien: Politische Gegner werden beschämt, eingeschüchtert und verprügelt

Beschmierte Motorhauben, auflauernde Schlägertrupps: Die Regierung in Tiflis drangsaliert Protestierende. Trotzdem marschieren sie fast täglich zu Zehntausenden. Wie es jetzt weitergehen könnte.

www.spiegel.de

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

4 years

@RepKinzinger While we fight for our freedom, sir, US needs to take sovereign action to defend its values and interests, and help us by doing its job. #SanctionBidzinaIvanishvili This is the only effective and timely action for now.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

He also knows very well that these are not state agencies in any meaningful sense but coercive organizations enforcing the personalist rule of one men, who rules for the totalitarian Empire from the north.

Giorgi Gakharia

@GakhariaGiorgi

5 months

People receive calls of threats on deliberately pre-selected numbers, specific time & specific geolocation. I know this cannot happen without operative support of State Security Service, Police @MIAofGeorgia , Prosecutor’s Office @OfficialPOG , Special State Protection Service. I

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

US House of Representatives diagnoses GE events correctly- Rapid Belarusization. Sanctions package similar to Belarus sanctions is placed on the table.

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

🧵Ivanishvili's Regime in Georgia bulldozes its way to adopt the foreign agents' legislation by the third reading. What's next for the regime, Georgians, and the Western states/institutions? /1

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

The Russian foreign agents law will go in force. However, to avoid/soften/delay sanctions, the regime will try to lure Western states and institutions with measures of autocratic legalism promising some nicer facade building. /2

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

Some of these people are malign actors. But for some, this failure comes from their intellectual laziness and moral cowardice. /END

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David Zedelashvili

@DZedelashvili

5 months

On invitation from @CivilGe I have reworked my thread on Georgia and Belarus into an article. Adding more flesh to the original arguments and reflecting on your constructive comments.

Civil.ge

@CivilGe

5 months

What was once unimaginable is now a chilling possibility. Read Davit Zedelashvili's thought-provoking analysis on the alarming trajectory of the Georgian gov't and the unsettling parallels with #Belarus . @DZedelashvili #Georgia #Authoritarianism

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