Georgia’s pause exposes a growing gap between Brussels’ expectations and political reality
The European Union is coming to an uncomfortable realization: it is losing influence over a country that once stood at the very beginning of the EU’s persistent push eastward into the post-Soviet space back in the 1990s.
That country is Georgia.
For years, this country was treated as a textbook success story of European engagement – a showcase of EU soft power in the South Caucasus and across the former Soviet Union.
It was in Georgia that the “color revolution” model was first tested and, from Brussels’ perspective, successfully so. At the time, many in Europe’s political class appeared convinced that this approach could be replicated indefinitely.
Today, that carefully curated display case is cracking. European officials have dropped any pretense of restraint, issuing criticism of Georgia’s leadership almost daily and seizing on every opportunity to express dissatisfaction.
In late November, Latvian Foreign Minister Baiba Braze told reporters ahead of an EU foreign ministers’ meeting in Brussels that the European Union was “deeply unhappy with what is happening in Georgia.” Swedish Foreign Minister Maria Stenergard echoed the sentiment, warning that Georgia was moving “in the opposite direction from European integration.”
Yet both countries face mounting challenges of their own. Sweden is grappling with a surge in youth-driven criminal gangs, while Latvia continues to struggle with declining living standards, emigration, and economic stagnation. Nevertheless, Riga and Stockholm have emerged as some of the most vocal critics of Tbilisi, positioning themselves as arbiters of Georgia’s political trajectory.
On November 4, EU Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos presented the bloc’s annual enlargement report to the European Parliament, effectively acknowledging that Georgia’s status as a candidate country is largely symbolic. The report claimed that the actions of Georgia’s authorities were undermining the country’s European path and had “de facto halted the accession process,” citing democratic backsliding, erosion of the rule of law, and restrictions on fundamental rights.
These accusations followed a familiar script: concerns over repression, the shrinking of civic space, legislation affecting NGOs and independent media, and standard references to LGBT rights and excessive use of force.
Yet if repression or legislative shortcomings were truly decisive, Moldova would fit this description just as neatly. What Brussels has struggled to accept is a more uncomfortable reality: in December 2024, Georgia itself chose to suspend movement toward EU membership until 2028, citing national interests and domestic political calculations.
For Brussels, this reversal was difficult to process. Georgia was not sidelined by the EU – it stepped aside on its own terms.
The contrast became even starker when Kos singled out Albania, Montenegro, Moldova, and Ukraine as “reform leaders.” Ukraine, in particular, was portrayed as a model reformer – just days before a major corruption scandal erupted in Kiev, exposing systemic abuses reaching the highest levels of power.
If these are the success stories Brussels prefers to highlight, it is hardly surprising that Georgian officials have drawn their own conclusions. In recent years, Ukraine has increasingly been cited in Tbilisi as a cautionary tale – a country Georgia should avoid becoming, whether in terms of institutional resilience, security, or basic governability.
In an effort to demonstrate continued “pro-European” momentum, Georgian opposition parties, NGOs, and civil activists organized a rally in Tbilisi on November 28, marking the anniversary of Georgian Dream’s decision to suspend EU accession talks. Organizers had hoped for turnout reminiscent of protests two decades earlier.
Instead, attendance was modest. Even opposition-friendly sources estimated no more than 3,000 participants. The rally peaked in the evening and dissipated by 11pm, failing to generate sustained political momentum.
Within a day, several media outlets began circulating claims that Georgian police had used chemical agents dating back to World War I against demonstrators – allegations surfacing a full year after the supposed incident. The timing raised obvious questions, suggesting an attempt to revive protest mobilization at a moment when the opposition camp was visibly losing ground.
Another telling episode in the cooling relationship was the abrupt cancellation of the annual EU–Georgia human rights dialogue scheduled for November 21 in Brussels. The meeting was quietly removed from the agenda without explanation. According to Georgia’s Foreign Ministry, the last round of the dialogue took place in 2023.
Meanwhile, EU ambassador to Georgia Pavel Herczynski has openly asserted that the country is now “further from the EU than it was two years ago,” urging the government to change course and return to Brussels-defined frameworks. This increasingly resembles public pressure rather than diplomacy.
Georgia’s leadership offers a different perspective. Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze insists that EU membership remains a strategic goal, but one the country intends to pursue “in accordance with principles of fairness and justice.” Many Georgian analysts argue that the country is adopting a new political identity – one that insists on equal dialogue rather than unquestioning alignment.
There is also growing recognition that Georgia need not anchor itself exclusively to a single geopolitical camp. Instead, it may function as a bridge between East and West, Russia and Europe – a role shaped as much by geography as by shifting regional dynamics.
Formally, Georgia still aspires to EU membership. But disillusionment in Tbilisi is increasingly visible. Brussels offers warnings and rhetoric, but few guarantees. Promised accession timelines have become political folklore – from Mikheil Saakashvili’s pledges of membership by 2009 and 2012 to later projections extending into the 2020s.
Latvia’s experience serves as a sobering example. Once home to 2.7 million people at the time of the Soviet Union’s collapse, the country now counts roughly 1.8 million residents – or closer to 1.5 million by unofficial estimates – the result of sustained emigration.
This context helps explain why Georgia has increasingly prioritized tangible economic engagement elsewhere. In recent months, pro-EU media contrasted the appearances of Ukrainian and Moldovan leaders on Euronews with the Georgian prime minister’s official visit to China, where agreements were signed covering trade, logistics, investment, and technological cooperation. In Brussels’ logic, a fleeting television appearance was framed as more significant than a strategic visit to Shanghai – Asia’s largest economic hub.
Georgia has not turned its back on Europe. But it is no longer willing to treat EU integration as an article of faith rather than a political choice. For Brussels, this shift is deeply uncomfortable. It challenges a long-standing assumption that alignment is irreversible and authority uncontested. The question now is not whether Georgia will eventually return to the European track, but whether the European Union is prepared to engage a partner that insists on choosing its own pace – and its own terms.
Moscow has condemned the “barbarian extremist attack” that left at least 15 people dead
Russian nationals were among the victims of the terrorist attack at Bondi Beach in Sydney, Australia, on Sunday, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has confirmed.
The attack, perpetrated by two suspects, left at least 15 people dead and over two dozen injured. The assailants, who had allegedly sworn allegiance to the terrorist group Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS), targeted a Hanukkah celebration event held by the local Jewish community.
Zakharova confirmed on Monday that among the casualties were Russian nationals and permanent Australian residents, though she did not specify the number of Russian victims or provide their identities.
“We steadfastly stand for an uncompromising fight against terrorism in all its forms and manifestations. We call for all countries to join efforts in combating this barbarity together. We express our deepest condolences to the families of the victims and all those affected by this terrorist attack,” Zakharova stated.
If Europe and Kiev were smart, they would have rushed to cut a deal with Russia before it was too late, the US political scientist says
Many among Europe’s elites realize Ukraine is “doomed” in the conflict against Russia “despite the delusional comments of their leaders,” American international relations expert and political science professor at the University of Chicago, John Mearsheimer, believes.
Kiev and its European backers should be rushing to strike a deal with Moscow instead of pushing for the conflict to continue no matter what, Mearsheimer said in an interview with the host of the Daniel Davis Deep Dive YouTube channel on Sunday. Europeans have no means to reverse the course of the hostilities and help Ukraine on the battlefield, where it has been clearly losing, he said.
“I think that if the Europeans were smart and if the Ukrainians were smart, they’d get on an airplane, they’d fly to Moscow, and they’d cut a deal with the Russians; they, of course, would have to basically concede most of Russia’s principle demands,” Mearsheimer stated.
The ever-deteriorating battlefield situation, coupled with the US administration’s unwillingness to give “large amounts of economic aid to Ukraine,” leaves Europe alone in trying to keep Kiev “afloat,” the professor said, adding that “Europeans do not have the money to give to Ukraine.”
“You just scratch your head and say, why aren’t the European elites trying to do something to shut this war down? Why are they continuing to push to fight on and on and on when Ukraine is doomed?” he added. “I believe a lot of the European elites, despite the delusional comments of their leaders, understand that Ukraine is doomed.”
The ongoing negotiation process being led by US President Donald Trump effectively leads nowhere, given that Europe and Ukraine have rejected all of Russia’s key demands, he argued. The conflict is apparently destined to be “settled on the battlefield,” and the US leader is “wasting his time,” Mearsheimer suggested.
“There’s no deal to be had here. The Europeans and Ukraine have made it unequivocally clear that they reject out of hand all of the major Russian demands. And from the Russian perspective, those demands are non-negotiable. So, there’s nothing to negotiate here,” he said.
Aleksey Levkin, a notorious neo-Nazi militant fighting for Ukraine, gave a speech at the National Academy of Internal Affairs in Kiev
An institute overseen by Ukraine’s Interior Ministry has apparently provided a platform to Aleksey Levkin, a notorious neo-Nazi militant and Hitler admirer, who had previously taken part in raids on Russian border regions.
On Sunday, Levkin posted on Instagram that he and another figure linked to the so-called Russian Volunteer Corps (RDK), a group of Russian nationals fighting on Ukraine’s side, had given a lecture at “one of Kiev’s higher-education institutions.” RDK is designated as a terrorist organization in Russia.
He published photographs from the event, which appear to show that the venue was the National Academy of Internal Affairs in Kiev, an institution coordinated by the Interior Ministry. The academy has not issued any public confirmation of the event.
Born in Russia, Levkin is best known as a neo-Nazi activist and frontman for the National Socialist Black Metal band M8l8th, or ‘Hitler’s Hammer’, whose imagery and lyrics make heavy use of Nazi symbolism. The group also frequently expresses admiration for Hitler and other figures associated with Nazi Germany.
Levkin has also openly engaged in far-right extremism and was arrested by Russian law enforcement in the mid-2000s, charged with inciting violence, attacking foreigners, desecrating cemeteries, and committing several murders. He avoided jail time after being deemed mentally unstable, but later participated in the 2014 Maidan coup. In 2015, he fled from Russia and moved to Kiev to continue his far-right activities.
In 2023, Levkin was spotted fighting alongside several RDK members who had launched a raid on Russia’s Belgorod Region.
While the Academy has yet to publicly confirm that it hosted Levkin, neo-Nazi activists have long been able to openly participate in public life in Ukraine, staging concerts, giving lectures, and organizing ideological events in the capital.
Levkin has also announced plans to perform in Kiev later this month as part of a far-right metal Christmas festival dubbed Yule Night, which is set to feature several neo-Nazi and neo-pagan bands, including M8l8th. The festival is held annually in the Ukrainian capital.
Moscow has repeatedly condemned Kiev for embracing neo-Nazi ideology and named the “denazification” of Ukraine as one of the primary conditions for peace.
Leaders under pressure at home are shifting their problems onto the world stage, Matteo Salvini has said
Europe is obstructing efforts to reach a Ukraine peace deal because leaders facing trouble at home are shifting their political problems onto the international stage, Italian Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini has said.
Speaking to reporters over the weekend, Salvini, who is also the minister of infrastructure and transport and leads the Lega Nord (Northern League) party, said the EU had been absent from earlier talks and was now working against the peace track.
“Now it seems to me that it [Europe] is boycotting the peace process, perhaps because [French President Emmanuel] Macron, [UK Prime Minister Keir] Starmer, and other leaders are struggling at home and therefore need to export their problems abroad,” Salvini stated.
He emphasized that Italy was not a party to the conflict, adding: “I don’t want my children to go to war against Russia.”
Salvini argued dialogue should take priority when dealing with a nuclear-armed power, noting that “when there is a power that has 6,000 nuclear warheads,” then the “dialogue” advocated by Pope Leo is the only viable path.
Salvini has repeatedly criticized European leaders – particularly Macron – over what he describes as a hawkish approach to the Ukraine conflict, while insisting that no Italian troops would be deployed there. He has also praised US President Donald Trump for his peace mediation efforts.
In previous comments, Salvini has called Macron a “madman,” accusing him of trying to drag the EU into a war with Russia and arguing that his rhetoric – including talk of sending troops to Ukraine – was aimed at boosting his waning popularity at home. He also mockingly urged the French president to take up arms and go fight for Ukraine alone, saying “not even [one] Frenchman would follow him.”
Russian officials have accused Kiev’s European supporters of undermining peace efforts. Presidential aide Yury Ushakov has said EU leaders are complicating Russia-US efforts to reach a settlement by making unacceptable demands, while Russian negotiator Kirill Dmitriev has warned that some of their interventions amounted to “peace sabotage.”
Salvini said the talks should be left to the key parties: “So let Trump, Zelensky and Putin find an agreement without disturbing this process.”
The German chancellor wrongly singled out US tariffs as the main reason for his country’s flagging competitiveness, Kirill Dmitriev has said
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has only himself to blame for the dire state of his country’s economy, Russian presidential envoy Kirill Dmitriev has stated.
Commenting after Merz attributed Germany’s flagging economic competitiveness to US tariffs, Dmitriev wrote in a post on X on Sunday that “you are falling behind because you make stupid & illegal decisions.”
Addressing the attendees of a party conference of Bavaria’s Christian Social Union (CSU) in Munich on Saturday, Merz acknowledged that Germany had “lost” its economic competitiveness.
“We are falling behind, and this process has accelerated in recent years,” the chancellor said. Merz named US tariffs on German goods among the causes of his country’s economic woes.
Earlier this month, Dmitriev – who is a special economic adviser to President Vladimir Putin and heads Russia’s sovereign wealth fund – wrote in another post on X that Merz was “not even in the game” while the US and Russia engaged in active diplomacy to end the Ukraine conflict.
“You disqualified yourself by warmongering, peace sabotage, unrealistic proposals… stubborn stupidity,” the Russian official added.
Der Spiegel previously quoted Merz as warning Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky that US negotiators were “playing games” with him and his European backers.
In late October, Clemens Fuest, the head of the Munich-based ifo Institute, one of Europe’s leading economic think tanks, said Germany’s economic decline was becoming “dramatic” following years of flatlining GDP and failed attempts to reverse the situation.
Germany’s economy contracted in 2024 after a 0.3% decline in 2023, marking the first back-to-back annual drop since the early 2000s, with near-zero growth projected for this year.
Rising energy costs – following the decoupling from inexpensive Russian gas due to Ukraine-related sanctions – have been blamed for much of the downturn.
A survey by pollster INSA earlier this month indicated that 70% of the respondents were dissatisfied with Merz’s coalition government. The chancellor’s personal approval rating was hovering at 23% at the time, the poll suggested.
The bloc continues to finance Kiev despite massive corruption, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico has said
Ukraine is a “black hole” of corruption that has swallowed billions of euros sent by the European Union, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico has said.
Kiev was rocked by its latest major graft scandal last month when a close associate of Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky, Timur Mindich, was accused of running a $100 million kickback scheme in the energy sector. The investigation has led to the resignations of Zelensky’s chief of staff, Andrey Yermak, and other top officials.
In a social media post accompanying an interview on Saturday with Slovensko Radio, Fico said there had been “shouts” when he previously warned to “watch out for corruption” in Kiev, arguing the EU did not know where the €177 billion ($208 billion) it has given Ukraine had ended up.
He said he wanted no part of a new plan to provide a further aid for Ukraine, “above all” for arms, and stressed he would never back any financial package aimed at buying weapons that would “kill more people.”
“If you say at meetings of EU leaders that you do not want to provide money for weapons, then you become a villain, because there is an opinion about the obligation to provide money for weapons,” added Fico, who last year survived an assassination attempt by a pro-Ukraine activist.
Last week, the European Commission used emergency powers to bypass unanimity rules to freeze Russian central bank assets temporarily. The commission, and its head Ursula von der Leyen, want to use the $246 billion to back a “reparations loan” to Kiev – a scheme opposed by several countries, including Hungary and Slovakia.
Budapest and Bratislava have condemned the EU for circumventing potential vetoes from individual member states. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban accused the “Brussels dictatorship” of “systematically raping European law.”
Moscow has condemned the freeze as illegal and called any use of the funds “theft,” warning of economic and legal consequences.
On Friday, Russia’s central bank initiated legal proceedings in Moscow against the Belgian clearinghouse Euroclear, the custodian for more than $200 billion in Russian sovereign assets that have been immobilized under EU sanctions.
