Irakli Kobakhidze: "'Deep state' is trying to artificially fuel Russophobia in Georgia"
“Radical anti-Russian sentiment in the country is being artificially fuelled and is part of a new campaign against Georgia,” Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze said at a briefing. He said attempts to intensify Russophobia in Georgia were part of a plan carried out by agents of the “deep state”.
Kobakhidze recalled that the Georgian government had repeatedly said that, after Russia launched its full-scale war against Ukraine in 2022, the so-called “global war party” had tried to draw Georgia into the conflict and open a “second front” in the country.
The prime minister said this “window of opportunity” created an “existential threat” to Georgia and its population. He said calls for Georgia to join international sanctions against Russia soon followed. According to the government, complying with those demands would have had serious consequences for the country’s economy.
“Because the Georgian government refused to comply with these demands, pursued a sovereign policy and acted in the interests of the state, our country became a target for the European bureaucracy and Western leaders working in tandem with informal oligarchic forces,” Kobakhidze said.
He also addressed the sanctions imposed by Western countries on the Georgian government. According to Kobakhidze, pressure mechanisms, including sanctions, were already being used when the previous US administration under Joe Biden was in power.
Kobakhidze said the sanctions had targeted senior Georgian government officials, ruling party honorary chairman Bidzina Ivanishvili, judges, senior police officers and others.
He said the West had also used Georgia’s EU membership prospects as a tool to pressure the government.
“They failed to break the ruling party, which enjoys the support of the Georgian people, so now they are trying to use their agents to drag Georgia into a new provocation,” he added.
Kobakhidze said a “new stage of the attack” on Georgia, its people and its sovereignty had begun:
“This is a qualitatively new stage of the attack on Georgia, the Georgian people and the country’s sovereignty, unfolding simultaneously on several fronts.”
Background
Several days before the anniversary of the August 2008 war, Irakli Kobakhidze published a lengthy letter addressing the issue of “Russophobia”.
In the letter, Kobakhidze discussed the links between Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, Georgia’s domestic political situation and the opposition’s position. He said the “global war party” benefited from the ongoing conflict in Ukraine because it wanted to “fuel Russophobia at the highest level among its agents around the world, including in Georgia”.
Kobakhidze accused the opposition and civil society of changing their attitude towards Russia. He described their current tough stance towards Moscow as “Russophobia”.
The letter reignited political disputes over the events of the 2008 war. This time, however, the debate focused not only on the circumstances that led to the war and Russia’s responsibility. The prime minister shifted the focus from Russia’s actions to the position of his Georgian opponents.
Georgian PM on “Russophobia”
