Russia Claims US Planning ‘Color Revolution’ in Georgia

Russia believes the U.S. is preparing to delegitimize the upcoming election in the former Soviet republic of Georgia in a “color revolution.”

Georgia’s upcoming election is scheduled for October this year, when voters will choose their representatives in Parliament.

The ruling party, Georgian Dream, has been in power since 2012 and has been accused by the opposition and some Western organizations, including the European Union, of backsliding democracy in several ways.

Now, the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) is preempting the U.S. government getting involved in the election, saying the White House is “extremely dissatisfied with the landscape” in Georgia, a country which has international attention on it for its strategic location and NATO aspirations.

The SVR said: “The Americans are preparing a color revolution in Georgia. At the ‘Tbilisi maidan’ they plan to make public ‘evidence of falsifications’ in voting, announce nonrecognition of the election results and demand a change of power. Law enforcement agencies will be provoked to suppress the protests by force.”

The U.S. will then come up with a response to what they will call the “excessive” use of force against “peaceful citizens,” the SVR said in its statement, reported by the Russian state-owned news agency TASS.

“Georgian pro-Western non-governmental organizations are recruiting a large number of people to closely monitor the voting process,” the SVR went on, “they are tasked with identifying and recording ‘imminent facts’ of the authorities’ use of administrative resources even if they do not exist. Washington is providing additional funding for local opposition youth associations, which are expected to become the ‘locomotive’ of postelection protests.”

The SVR added: “The Americans intend to turn up the heat on the Georgian authorities on a large scale in the remaining weeks before the elections in order to weaken the electoral position of Georgian Dream as much as possible. They plan to use a ‘tried-and-tested tool’: personal sanctions against the top leaders of the party, their family members, as well as the party’s sponsors.”

Newsweek has contacted the U.S. Department of State via email for a response to this.

On the U.S. Department of State’s website, it says the U.S. is “committed to helping Georgia deepen Euro-Atlantic ties and strengthen its democratic institutions.”

It comes after the capital of Tbilisi saw major demonstrations earlier this year, against a Russia-style “foreign agent” law which would ultimately create a register of “foreign agents” in Georgia, which would include all nonprofit legal entities and media outlets that receive more than 20 percent of their funding from abroad.

At the time, the U.S. State Department spokesman Ned Price, said that the bill was “based on similar Russian and Hungarian laws, not on FARA or any other American law.”

In March, Senior Counselor at the Permanent Mission of Georgia to the United Nations Akaki Dvali wrote for Newsweek, urging the West to “save Georgia from any of Putin’s potential aggressions.”

“The West should finally take courage and expedite Georgia’s EU and NATO integration process, along with that of other aspirant countries,” he said.

Newsweek has contacted the Central Election Commission (CEC) of Georgia for comment.