Georgia deports 25 foreigners who participated in protests

Georgia will deport 25 foreigners who participated in protests in Tbilisi. This was reported by the republic's Interior Ministry on January 4.

"Among the persons against whom the Migration Department of the Interior Ministry has started the deportation procedure are foreign citizens who participated in the protests in Tbilisi in November-December and who were awarded various administrative sanctions by the court. In total - 25 persons, 10 of them foreign citizens, have already left the territory of Georgia," the report published on the website of the Georgian department says.

A total of 91 foreigners were expelled from the country by the Interior Ministry's Migration Department between November and December, among those deported were citizens of Iran, Algeria, India, Morocco, Sri Lanka, Egypt, Pakistan, Nigeria, Iraq, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Russia, Turkmenistan and other states.

"As of 2024, the Migration Department has expelled 430 foreign nationals from the country, up 126% from a year earlier," the report said.

Not to lose chapters: political situation in Georgia stabilizes after inauguration

What to expect from Mikhail Kavelashvili and what will happen to Salome Zurabishvili

On December 29 last year, the inauguration ceremony of the new president of Georgia was held. It was specified that Mikhail Kavelashvili would start his duties in the presidential residence of the country, despite the refusal of the previous president of Georgia Salome Zurabishvili to leave it. However, she soon left the building after all.

Zurabishvili did not recognize the results and refused to leave her post despite the completion of her term of office on December 29. Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze said at the time that she would face criminal liability for doing so.

This comes against the backdrop of ongoing protests in Georgia over the suspension of negotiations on European integration and the opposition's disagreement with the results of the parliamentary elections held in late October, the results of which Zurabishvili also does not recognize. According to the assessment of Middle East and Caucasus expert Stanislav Tarasov, which he shared with Izvestia, she may create an opposition parliament, which threatens a dual power in the country and a power scenario.