TBILISI, October 9. /TASS/. Georgian Parliament Chairman Shalva Papuashvili considers the European Parliament’s (EP) resolution calling on the country’s authorities to impose sanctions on Russia to be "disgusting."

Earlier, 14 EP members prepared a draft resolution on Georgia. In particular, the document calls on the ruling Georgian Dream - Democratic Georgia party to withdraw the adopted laws on foreign agents and ban of LGBT propaganda (the movement is designated as extremist Russia and prohibited by law), to impose sanctions against Russia, and release former President Mikhail Saakashvili from prison. Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) also called on the European Council (EC) to impose sanctions against Bidzina Ivanishvili, founder of the ruling Georgian Dream - Democratic Georgia party.

"This demand to establish bilateral sanctions against Russia, which was put forward in the resolution on Georgia, is disgusting. What makes this resolution scandalous is that it is the first official EU public document that explicitly fixes the demand to impose sanctions against Russia," Papuashvili said at the briefing.

As the parliament chairman noted, the authors of the resolution know perfectly well that by sanctioning Russia, the Georgian authorities would be hurting themselves. "We would inevitably plunge the people and the country into economic collapse and, quite likely, expose ourselves to the threat of military conflict," he emphasized.

Papuashvili also criticized those calls that concerned releasing Saakashvili and imposing EC sanctions against Ivanishvili.

On February 25, 2022, then-Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili said that he did not intend to introduce sanctions against Russia, saying that it was not in Georgia’s national interests. At the beginning of March 2022, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky recalled the ambassador from Tbilisi because of the position of the Georgian authorities on sanctions. The Georgian government’s decision was also criticized by the opposition, which accused the authorities of collaborating with Russia.