Page 6 - GEORptMar21

Total exports in 2020, however, contracted by 12% y/y to $3.34bn.
On the political front, Georgia’s prime minister Giorgi Gakharia resigned on February 18 after condemning an “unacceptable” court ruling ordering the pre-trial detention of opposition leader Nika Melia. On February 23, Melia was detained amid a situation in which the opposition parties have been boycotting the parliament, claiming last autumn’s general election was fixed in Georgian Dream’s favour. He was taken into custody after allegedly refusing to post bail on charges of organising and using group violence during June 2019 protests in Tbilisi, charges he claims are politically motivated.
Georgia’s new PM, Irakli Garibashvili, said in one of his first statements as head of the Georgian Dream government that snap elections—the main demand from the opposition parties—were out of the question and that “ordinary criminal” Melia belonged in jail—he made that comment despite the fact Melia has not yet stood trial.
2.0 Politics
2.1 Georgian opposition begins protests to force snap
elections
The Georgian opposition has announced a plan for protests, after thousands of its supporters rallied outside the Georgian parliament building in Tbilisi on February 26 to call for new snap parliamentary elections and the release of political prisoners including the United National Movement (UNM) leader Nika Melia.
“We will not leave until our demands are met,” a protester who traveled 300 kilometres from the town of Zugdidi to participate in the rally told Radio Free Europe.
Over the weekend, opposition and civil rights activists set up nearly a dozen tents in front of the parliament building.
Activists spent the night in the tents following street demonstrations in Tbilisi on February 26 to protest a police raid on the headquarters of an opposition party and the arrest of its leader, who is currently under pre-trial police custody after prosecutors charged him with leading violence against parliament building on June 20, 2019.
Khatia Dekanoidze, a member of the UNM, outlined the plan at the rally in front of the parliament.Picketing the parliament building will start on March 2 and picketing the government’s building will start on Friday, March 5.
“We are planning a rally in front of the Ministry of Internal Affairs on March 9 because this agency arrests activists, violates human rights and does not understand that their main purpose is to serve the country and not Bidzina Ivanishvili,” announced Dekanoidze.
On March 11, opposition scheduled a rally in front of the Tbilisi court that it called the main symbol of the regime.
"On March 13, at the end of these rallies, we will meet again at the parliament. Of course, this will be another very important rally for freedom," Dekanoidze
6 GEORGIA Country Report March 2021 www.intellinews.com