Georgia to shut down state grant agency by year-end, PM

Georgia will shut down its Grant Management Agency by the end of the year, Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze said on Thursday, describing non-governmental organisations as an artificial instrument of foreign political intervention.

The agency is currently operating in a winding-down phase and will close by the end of 2026, Kobakhidze told journalists.

Kobakhidze added the government had reached the decision after, in his view, concluding that NGOs could be used as a means of foreign intervention.

“NGOs are an artificial phenomenon, artificially created for foreign political intervention,” he said.

“NGOs did not exist a century ago. They were later created and used as the main instrument of foreign intervention. We have seen numerous examples of this in Georgia.”

Kobakhidze said the government should not create NGOs or finance organisations that could serve such a purpose.

“Accordingly, for us to create NGOs and finance such a thing is wrong. That is why we made this decision,” he said.

The Grant Management Agency was established in April 2025 as a state mechanism for supporting civil society initiatives through government funding. The government subsequently introduced tighter rules governing grants from foreign sources, including a requirement for government approval in certain cases.

The agency's closure marks a change in the government's approach to its own grant-financing mechanism. The agency had been created after the government announced plans to provide state funding to civil society organisations amid a broader overhaul of rules governing foreign-funded NGOs.

Human Rights Watch has criticised Georgia's changes to its grants legislation, saying the amendments place foreign funding under greater government control and can restrict independent civil society organisations. The Georgian authorities have rejected such criticism and said the measures were intended to regulate foreign funding and protect national interests.