Georgia president says parliament ‘illegitimate’ as pro-EU protests sweep country

Paris: Georgia geared up for a third night of protests on Saturday after the country’s prime minister shelved talks on joining the European Union until 2028.

The Black Sea nation has been rocked by turmoil since the ruling Georgian Dream party claimed victory in a disputed October 26 parliamentary election that the pro-European opposition said was fraudulent.

President Salome Zourabichvili, whose role is largely ceremonial, said in an address on Thursday that parliament had no right to elect her successor when her term ends in December, and that she would stay in post.

“We are confronting today the stolen elections, the illegitimate parliament; and an illegitimate parliament cannot elect anything other than an illegitimate government and an illegitimate president,” Zourabichvili told FRANCE 24 shortly after her address.

“My mandate ends when the new legitimate president will be elected. That depends on new elections and it’s the main demand of people on the streets,” added the president, who rallied with protesters in Tbilisi this week.

Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze’s announcement on Thursday that Georgia would not seek accession talks with the EU until 2028 ignited a furious reaction from the opposition.

Critics accuse the ruling Georgian Dream party – in power for more than a decade – of having steered the country away from the bloc in recent years and of moving closer to Russia, an accusation it denies.

“The people are not going to accept that (the ruling party) tries to take Georgia back into Russia,” said Zourabichvili, who has sought to annul the October election results through the country’s constitutional court.