Georgia’s ruling party introduces bill restricting LGBTQ+ rights

TBILISI, Ga. (AP) — Georgia’s ruling party on Tuesday introduced a bill restricting LGBTQ+ rights.

The Georgian Dream proposals are similar to laws enacted in Russia and follow the authorities’ adoption of another law that critics denounced as borrowed from the Moscow playbook – the “foreign influence” law. It sparked weeks of mass protests and was widely criticized for threatening democratic freedoms and putting Georgia’s chances of joining the European Union at risk.

If passed, the bill would prohibit same-sex marriages, gender-affirming care and changing the gender marker on official documents, adoption by same-sex couples, public endorsement of relationships between people of the same sex in meetings and in educational institutions, and the representation of people of the same sex. same-sex relationships in the media.

The new initiative was announced by parliament speaker and Georgian Dream member Shalva Papuashvili just one day after he signed the “foreign influence” law into force.

The “foreign influence” law requires media outlets and non-governmental organizations to register as “agents of foreign influence” if they receive more than 20% of their budget from abroad. He left mass protests last month in the Georgian capital, Tbilisi, and opponents dubbed him “ Russian law ” because it resembles Russia’s regulations that the Kremlin uses to suppress dissent.

Georgian President Salome Zourabichvili vetoed the bill, but parliament overrode her veto and on Monday Papuashvili signed it into law.

Georgian Dream’s proposals that restrict LGBTQ+ rights could also draw comparisons with current laws in Russia. Russian authorities over the past decade have also banned public endorsement of “non-traditional sexual relations”,gender affirming care and gender reassignment in official documents.

In the latest step against the already beleaguered community, Russia’s Supreme Court effectively banned LGBTQ+ activism labeling what authorities called an LGBTQ+ “movement” operating in Russia as an extremist organization and banning it.