MOSCOW, June 4. /TASS/. The West may try to implement another "maidan-like" scenario in Georgia by October in order to create another hotbed of tensions near Russia’s border, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin told TASS.
"We can see attempts by the Westerners to escalate the situation in Georgia ahead of the parliamentary elections set for October," he noted. "We don’t rule out that the goal is to try to implement a 'maidan-like' scenario for a change of government in order to create another hotbed of tensions near Russia’s border," Galuzin added.
According to him, the US and EU countries are shamelessly putting pressure on many sovereign countries. "This time, the Westerners decided to focus on Georgia after the country initiated the law On the Transparency of Foreign Influence, even though the United States and other countries of the so-called global 'minority' already have or are mulling far tougher rules," the deputy foreign minister noted. "Brussels and Washington exploded with hypocritical accusations 'of undermining democracy' and failing to comply with ‘European’ and 'Euro-Atlantic' values, as well as with threats to impose personal sanctions, block Georgia’s 'Euro-Atlantic prospects,' deprive the country of its EU candidate status and suspend the visa waiver for its citizens," Galuzin added.
The senior Russian diplomat also pointed out that the foreign ministers of Lithuania, Estonia and Iceland had taken part in street protests in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi in mid-May. "It’s hard to describe this as anything but blatant interference in the domestic affairs of an independent country," he stressed. "These are disgusting examples of neo-colonial practices of imposing their views on the countries whose sovereignty they seek to limit," he said.
"For our part, we are interested in Georgia’s stable and democratic development. However, unlike the US and the EU, we don’t interfere in the internal affairs of sovereign countries," the Russian deputy foreign minister concluded.