The European Union and the United States have backed opposition calls for an investigation into the October 26 election, seen in Georgia as a choice between a future in the European Union or a return to Russia’s orbit.
After years of increasingly authoritarian Georgian Dream rule, the vote was seen as the most important since Georgians supported independence from the Soviet Union in 1991.
Tens of thousands of Georgians have already taken to the streets to protest the disputed result, but the election commission’s decision on Saturday to confirm the ruling party’s victory sparked new demonstrations in the center of the capital.
The commission said the GD won 53.9% of the vote and 89 seats in the 150-seat parliament. But Edison Research, one of two respected US firms that conducted exit polls for opposition TV channels, said the commission’s figure could not be explained by “normal fluctuations”.
After opposition protesters, many of them students, erected tents and barricades outside Tbilisi State University, police moved in early Tuesday to disperse them by force.
Among those arrested was the operator of the opposition TV channel, several people were injured.
One of the opposition leaders, Helen Khashtaria, told the BBC that the protests will continue because they are fighting for the people’s votes and fighting for Georgia’s European future.
The EU said it would send a mission to Georgia to discuss “irregularities” in the vote, warning that the government in Tbilisi would not be able to move towards EU membership “without major changes”.
