"When you no longer recognize the will of the people, you are already partially ending democracy. When you go against the will of the people, you are not a democracy”, said Georgia's Fifth President, Salome Zurabishvili, in an interview at the Munich Security Conference.

In response to the question, "Is Georgia still a democracy?" Zurabishvili replied, "Barely."

When asked, "When did Georgia stop being a democracy?" she said:

"It may have been during the elections, because when you no longer recognize the will of the people, you are already partially ending democracy. And even more so, when a month after the election, the government, which is considered illegitimate and has gone against the Constitution of Georgia, which has effectively rejected Article 78 of the Constitution, which mandates all institutions of the country to do everything within their competence and capacity to promote and accelerate Georgia’s Euro-Atlantic integration, when the government decides to halt negotiations on EU membership – this is unconstitutional, it goes against the will of the people. For over 30 years since the restoration of independence, and many, many years before that, more than 80% of the Georgian population has supported Euro-Atlantic integration. When you go against this will, you are not a democracy," Zurabishvili noted.

She also emphasized that there is no independent institution in Georgia that is not controlled by one party.

"There is no independent institution in Georgia that is not controlled by one party, and this party is controlled by one man, and that man is, most likely, controlled by Moscow," Zurabishvili said in the interview.