In my opinion, the conclusion of the OSCE countries’ expert mission will not be intended for “Georgian Dream”; it will be for international partners, indicating that harsher political instruments should be used against “Georgian Dream,” lawyer Nika Simonishvili said on PalitraNews’ program “Free Studio” regarding the activation of the “Moscow Mechanism” on Georgia, which 24 OSCE countries have joined.

According to Simonishvili, after the OSCE mission’s report is prepared, “Georgian Dream” will not retreat, because, as he explained, the ruling team has never had a practice of stepping back.

“This precedent, which will likely be created in relation to Georgia, already indicates how grave the situation in the country appears in the eyes of the international community.

I have no doubt that this conclusion will not be favorable for ‘Georgian Dream,’ because we have numerous assessments by OSCE/ODIHR regarding human rights legislation, opinions from the Venice Commission, and the European Court of Human Rights is also reviewing cases at a rapid pace. After all this, I do not think a positive conclusion will be issued.

I do not think there will be enough wisdom within ‘Georgian Dream’ to retreat. Practice shows that they may stop at some point and go no further, but they have never had a practice of retreating.

In my view, this conclusion will not be for ‘Georgian Dream’; it will be for international partners, so that harsher political instruments are used against ‘Georgian Dream,’” Simonishvili stated.

The lawyer also assessed new legislative initiatives by “Georgian Dream,” under which the law on grants is being tightened and foreign lobbying will become punishable under criminal law.

Simonishvili described the tightened laws as a “disaster” and “paranoia.”

According to his explanation, “Georgian Dream” wants to control every individual’s money, because a person who is financially dependent on the authorities can no longer be free.

“What is happening to this country now is one big disaster. What these people are writing into these laws with complete seriousness is total paranoia. If you receive funding that I don’t like, we’ll put you in prison for six years - that is, in short, what is written in the law.

This is the introduction of a conceptually new constitutional order, and this order is in no way democratic. It means that power belongs only to them - the politicians of ‘Georgian Dream.’ No, power belongs to the people; the people exercise political activity through politicians, and political activity is based precisely on the people. Otherwise, it is no longer democracy.

There is one key point here - they (‘Georgian Dream’) want to control all funds, meaning that people’s political independence depends on their financial independence. ‘Georgian Dream’ controls hundreds of thousands of people in the country through poverty and financial dependence, and it does this with budget money. Now it wants to extend this control to disobedient businesses whose money it cannot control and for which it did not have full mechanisms. It wants to control money coming from abroad as well. Why were emigrants excluded from the electoral process? Because it could not control the financial situation of emigrants; they were not financially dependent on ‘Georgian Dream,’” Simonishvili said.