Gia Volski: No, I don’t expect sanctions from the United States.

No, I do not expect (sanctions from the United States), because I cannot remove the topic of justice from the agenda in any way – I even consider the criticism to be unfair, because transparency is no less relevant in Georgia than in Europe and the United States! – said First Deputy Speaker of the Parliament Gia Volski regarding the statement by US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken that we should expect even more reactions from the United States in connection with the adoption of the law “On Transparency of Foreign Influence” in Georgia.

As Volski told reporters, every day they expect someone from partner countries or NGO donors to say that transparency is not a problem and that NGOs should not be involved in political activities.

According to Volski, the law adopted by the Parliament is completely normal and corresponds to the European standard.

“We heard the statement of the deputy spokesman of the US State Department that these issues are being discussed, but we cannot say what the results will be – we are waiting for further statements.

Practice shows that non-governmental organizations were supposedly ready for such transparency, and then the issue was removed from the agenda. This is what led to the bill returning to the agenda.

We demand transparency in the financing of non-governmental organizations and concrete programs. There is no law similar to the Russian law and it corresponds to the interest of the Georgian state not to use the resources of non-governmental organizations for destabilization purposes.

Unfortunately, we have seen an example of this: the leaders of non-governmental organizations demanded the dismissal of the government and the creation of a technical government. They even demanded bombs because Georgia was not participating in hostilities.

We have an example where a non-governmental organization falsified the parallel vote count, which caused a serious controversy and created a rather serious precondition for destabilization.

According to Charles Michel’s agreement, non-governmental organizations had to assume a certain responsibility, but they remained in the political field, on the front line of the political struggle.

“On this basis, the law we have adopted is completely normal and in line with European standards,” said Gia Volski.