EU calls for halt to police violence inGeorgia after force used on protesters

Western politicians and diplomats have called for a halt to rising violence in Georgia after security forces used water cannon, tear gas, stun grenades and rubber bullets overnight to break up a peaceful rally against a "foreign influence" bill.

- Jon Henley

The EU, which has granted Georgia candidate status, "strongly condemned" the violence and called on the government to respect the right of peaceful assembly. "Use of force to suppress it is unacceptable," the foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, said on X.

Georgian MPs brawled in parliament yesterday as they resumed debating the second reading of the bill, which would force NGOs, civil rights groups and media to register as "foreign agents" if more than 20% of their funding came from abroad.

Local media outlets showed a pro-government deputy throwing a book at opposition MPs, while others shouted and physically confronted their opponents. Opposition parties, the EU and the US have criticised the bill as authoritarian and Russian-inspired.

Police detained 63 protesters in the capital, Tbilisi, on Tuesday night and six officers were injured, the interior ministry said, in the authorities' most violent crackdown yet on on the three-week-old protest movement.

Tuesday's rally continued well past midnight, with about 2,000 people blocking traffic outside parliament on Tbilisi's main avenue and other key roads, braving masked riot police who attacked protesters with rubber batons.