Opposition cornered, their plans to spark unrest failed – Papuashvili

The opposition parties have been cornered. Their plans to spark unrest in the country [following the European Council decision to grant Georgia European perspective and not a candidate status] have failed, Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili said on Tuesday.  

He said that three opposition parties, the United National Movement (UNM), Strategy Agmashenebeli and lelo, had refused to join his initiative to work together on addressing the 12 priorities set by the European Commission for Georgia to receive candidate status by the end of this year.  

Papuashvili said that the three parties, “which actually are the UNM, aimed to spark tension which they could not do due to the lack of public support.”  

Leader of Strategy Agmashenebeli, Giorgi Vashadze, said Monday  that Papuashvili’s initiative was “nothing real,” and that the current state authorities had no plans to address the priorities.  

The priorities included moves for depolarization, de-oligarchization, judiciary reforms and others. 

Papuashvili claimed that the ruling party and a part of the opposition were working on addressing the criteria “on a daily basis,” while  several opposition parties refused to get involved.