The last few days have seen an unprecedented, spontaneous mass mobilisation of citizens in Georgia’s regions in protest against the ruling Georgian Dream (GD) party’s recent announcement that the country would be suspending its EU membership bid until 2028.

On the night of November 30, residents of 18 towns and cities were reportedly participating in some form of self-organised protest. This number has now reportedly risen to nearly 30 settlements, as more and more Georgians come out in solidarity with the tens of thousands in the capital who continue to gather at the parliament building every evening.

Georgia is currently experiencing a wave of unrest, triggered by Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze’s announcement on November 28 that Georgia was halting its EU accession process until 2028 and would also accept no EU funding until that date. 

However, the nationwide revolt is aimed not just towards this single foreign policy choice, but towards the GD regime as a whole, which Georgians accuse of pursuing an increasingly anti-European path in favour of closer ties with the Kremlin, as well as rigging the October 26 parliamentary elections and usurping power by means of an illegitimate government. 

In the October 26 parliamentary elections, GD lost in all districts of Tbilisi but received very high support in poorer, rural areas of Georgia, in some cases as high as 85-90%. While the Georgian pro-Western opposition puts the 54% of the vote official figures say Georgian Dream took in the October vote down to widespread fraud and systemic electoral violations, bne IntelliNews found that some of the regional support for the ruling party was genuine. 

Sustained protests continue to spread throughout the country, including to politically inactive, small towns with populations of 10,000 or less, signalling the level of rage that suspending EU accession has triggered, particularly among those who voted for GD based on their campaign promise to secure Georgia’s membership in the European Union.

“Across Georgia, people are rising against the Russian puppetry regime. From the capital to the smallest towns, this is a moment unlike anything in our history,” Georgia’s pro-western President Salome Zourabichvili wrote on X in the early hours of December 3. 

On December 3, Georgia’s Constitutional Court ruled to reject lawsuits filed by the president and opposition leaders on November 19 regarding the unconstitutional nature of the October elections, citing breachers of voter secrecy and universality.

“The message [from protesters] is clear: Give me my vote back! Give me my European future back!” continued Zourabichvili, who has declared both the October elections and the GD government illegitimate.

Students and schoolchildren protest 

Universities and K-12 (kindergarten to 12th grade) schools are forming a central element of the resistance. On December 2, school pupils across Georgia launched a strike and began protests against the police violence during the dispersal of protesters in Tbilisi. According to open sources, as of 1pm on December 2, students from 15 schools across the country were striking, and that number is growing.

The Ministry of Education issued a statement on December 3 criticising the actions of the institutions, claiming that “such actions violate minors’ constitutional rights to receive general education”. Actions have gone ahead despite these threats.

On the evening of December 2, the fifth night of protests in Tbilisi kicked off with professors and students from Ilia State University marching down Chavchavadze Avenue to Rustaveli, urging other students across the students to join a nationwide strike.

Around 700 students from Kutaisi International University, an institution established and funded by GD honorary chair Bidzina Ivanishvili’s Cartu, announced a strike the following day. The students marched through the university campus on December 3, demanding a suspension of classes in response to the escalating protests.

Protesters gather in Kutaisi

At the Tsereteli University of Kutaisi, over 200 professors and students have signed a joint declaration condemning the ruling party’s decision to halt Georgia’s EU integration, as well as the police violence at the Tbilisi protests.

On December 2, secondary school students joined several hundred regular demonstrators at a rally outside the City Hall. “Universities are ours,” a protest organiser told the crowd through a microphone, “In our universities we study in order to change the future of this country. The duty of a student is first and foremost to fight and serve their country.”

The students then marched through the city chanting and waving Georgian and EU flags, coming to halt where Kutaisi’s Rustaveli Avenue meets Joseb Grishashvili street and blocking the intersection. 

At one stage, an elderly woman approached the demonstrators at the intersection and began to shout angrily at the organiser, gesticulating that the group should clear the road. She was gently led away from the scene by a policeman, but frequently turned back to shout at the students some more.

While the current unrest in Georgia does signal a widespread anti-GD, pro-European stance, many in the country, particularly among the older generation, fear the prospect of an invasion by Russia, something the ruling party vowed to prevent in its election campaign.

On December 3, school students returned to the streets in Kutaisi, forming a human blockade across a major artery in the centre of the old town. Protests continued in the city in the evening, and a video on X showed citizens ripping down a GD banner from the entrance of the local party offices.

Towns and villages rise up

School strikes have spread elsewhere in Georgia, including to villages, for example in the Zugdidi municipality in the north-west, where schools in Rukhi, Ingiri, Jikhaskari, Shamgoni and Kakhati are on strike.

The Black Sea coast city of Batumi, where students from the city’s State University are also striking, saw its fifth night of protests on December 2. A street rally took on unprecedented size as thousands of demonstrators completely took over the city’s main traffic artery, encircling the offices of Adjara TV, the local affiliate of the pro-government Georgian Public Broadcaster channel (GPB). 

Demonstrators in Batumi accuse the channel of spreading pro-Russian propaganda and failing to broadcast coverage of the police brutality taking place nightly in Tbilisi. On the evening of December 3, a group of 60 GPB employees released a public statement criticising police violence against protesters and accusing the network of bias and censorship, stating it failed to meet its constitutional obligation to provide impartial coverage.

According to the press team of the United National Movement party, Batumi has not seen protests of this size since the former local Russia-backed strongman, Aslan Abashidze, was expelled from the Adjara region during the Palm Revolution of 2004.

On the evening of December 3, footage of an ongoing mass rally in Batumi appeared on social media, with reports of clashes between protesters and police. Demonstrators appeared to be gathering in front of the local government headquarters and the Constitutional Court.

The small town of Ozurgeti in the western region of Guria has also been active, with two new protests springing up on December 3. While students held a major rally in the central square, activists took over the steps of the local police department to express solidarity with victims of police brutality in Tbilisi.

Zestaponi, typically a GD stronghold, has seen a huge turnout, with hundreds of protesters marching through the streets. On December 2, footage on X showed a member of the municipal GD government attempting to engaging an aggressive physical confrontation with pro-European protesters who had gathered in front of the local government building.

Police violence aims to punish

Meanwhile, nightly protests continue on Tbilisi’s Rustaveli Avenue, amid increasing concern surrounding the brutality being administered to protesters who are caught and arrested by the police. In Tbilisi alone, over 250 people have been detained over the last five nights. 

“The majority of the arrested protesters have injuries to their heads and faces, broken face bones, eye sockets, open wounds. [They] have been subjected to systematic beatings between arrest and transport to already overcrowded detention facilities. As reported by lawyers,” stated Zourabichvili, writing on X on December 2.

According to lawyers from the Legal Aid Network, many of the individuals detained in the early morning of December 2 were brutally beaten on their arrest, both on the streets where they were caught and in the police vans that transported them to detention centres. Several detainees are currently in medical facilities. Lawyers highlight how many have bruises all over their bodies and injuries to the facial area, including fractures of the nose and jaw as well as concussions.

As reported by local news platform Publika, on December 3, the Public Defender of Georgia, Levan Ioseliani, stated that “the location, nature, and extent of the injuries suggest credible evidence that the police are using violent methods against citizens as a form of punishment”. 

According to the Georgia Young Lawyers Association (GYLA) human rights and democracy watchdog, detainees reported that law enforcement officers committed acts of violence both during and after their arrest. The detainees describe being beaten by at least six officers inside a police van, punches targeting their heads and livers, officers discussing whether to break their arms or legs, and, on arrival at detention centres, being led through corridors of police who punched and kicked them as they passed. Some also had their shoes removes and their phones confiscated and checked.

Throughout the fifth night of protests, riot police continued to use tear gas and water cannons against protesters. In contrast to the previous four nights, on December 2 police began issuing warnings to the crowd to disperse very early on and moved in to clear people from the area in front of the parliament at around 9pm, three or four hours earlier than usual. 

Vaja Siradze, head of the Patrol Police Department, who is among the Georgian officials sanctioned by the Baltic states, told journalists that the decision to disperse the December 2 rally earlier than before was taken because the rally began with “aggression and violence” from a group of 300-400 people, and the police were “forced to use proportional force” against them. He claimed the group of people threw firecrackers, bottles and other objects at the police while simultaneously verbally abusing them.

Among those injured during the December 2-3 protest was a man in his early 20s who was reportedly struck in the head by a gas canister and rushed to hospital, arriving there around 4am on the morning of December 3. The Georgian news outlet On.ge quoted his attending physician, stating that the man was admitted ‘with an open scalp wound’ and remains in a medically induced coma. 

Kobakhidze praises police

At a press briefing on December 3, Kobakhidze praised the country’s Ministry of Internal Affairs for its handling of the crisis, stating the police response to the ongoing protests has met “higher standards than those seen in Europe and the USA”. While acknowledging that there had been few incidents of violence during the first two days of the protests, he said that “appropriate measures had been taken in the following days to prevent further escalation”.

Kobakhidze also alleged that certain Georgia opposition leaders and “wealthy NGOs” are playing a central role in organising the demonstrations, which he described as a “failed Maidan” under the leadership of the opposition United National Movement, of which former president Mikheil Saakashvili is honorary chair.

The prime minister issued a warning to the opposition and civil society, threatening punitive measures for 'organising violence’.  

"Of course, the politicians who organised this violence, and were hiding in their offices, cannot escape responsibility for the events that took place in these days. Also, during these days, leaders of wealthy NGOs who participated and supported these events, including violent events, were hiding in their offices. We have information that a number of activities were allegedly financed [by them], including the purchase of special equipment. Of course, leaders of wealthy NGOs hiding in their offices will also not escape legal responsibility," Kobakhidze said.