TBILISI, April 28. /TASS/. Participants in a grassroots protest rally against the law on foreign agents in downtown Tbilisi are clashing with the police, who used tear gas against them, a TASS correspondent reported.

The demonstrators who gathered in front of the entryway to the Georgian parliamentary building tried to get to the stage that was mounted ahead of a rally of supporters of the ruling Georgian Dream - Democratic Georgia party due on April 29. The police tried to stop them using tear gas.

Thousands of people gathered in Tbilisi’s central square on Sunday to protest against the notorious foreign agent law. After a several-hour rally, the demonstrators marched to the parliament building.

On April 17, Georgia’s parliament approved in the first reading a bill on foreign agents. It was opposed by Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili, the opposition and Western diplomats, who saw it as an obstacle to the country's integration into the European Union. Since Monday, the opposition and civil activists have been holding rallies against the bill in Tbilisi. Protests sometimes turn into clashes with police.

The ruling Georgian Dream-Democratic Georgia party announced in early April that it had decided to reintroduce the bill On the Transparency of Foreign Influence to parliament. This happened a year after a similar initiative triggered mass protests, forcing the authorities to abandon the bill. Its text remains identical to last year’s, except for the term "agent of foreign influence." Instead, the term "organization promoting the interests of a foreign power" is used.