Europe | Cue the fireworks

Huge anti-Russian protests in Tbilisi echo Ukraine’s Maidan

A turn away from the EU plunges Georgia into crisis

Georgian opposition protests in Tbilisi, Georgia - 30 Nov 2024
Photograph: EPA
|TBILISI

THE ECHOES seem obvious. A Kremlin-backed oligarch grabs power and breaks off the country’s relationship with the European Union, eliciting huge protests. Masked police beat up peaceful demonstrators, bringing more people onto the street. Such were the scenes during Kyiv’s Maidan revolution in 2013-14, which overthrew that country’s president and ultimately led to a Russian invasion.

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