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The UK sanctions 4 Georgians for Kremlin disinformation and names Tskhinvali’s leadersKazakhstan’s inflation slows to 9.3% in September as the tenge opens the week at 447.73Turkmenistan reports 6.3% growth for 9 months and a budget collected to 100.1% of planFour German party foundations stop work in Georgia after Tbilisi rejects their grants
Politics

Four German party foundations stop work in Georgia after Tbilisi rejects their grants

The Konrad Adenauer and Friedrich Naumann foundations closed their Tbilisi offices on 30 September after the government rejected on 28 July the grant applications the Law on Grants obliges them to file, and the Heinrich Böll and Friedrich Ebert foundations have followed, JAMnews reported on 2 and 3 October. Speaker Shalva Papuashvili said foreign political parties and their foundations “have no political mission to carry out in Georgia”.

By CAW Staff5 October 2026
Four brass mailboxes in a stone wall are taped shut, the tape on the fourth peeling away.

The Friedrich Naumann Foundation called its step inevitable: “The actions of the Georgian government make it impossible for the foundation to continue its activities in the country”. It had worked in Georgia since 2002.

The Konrad Adenauer Foundation, in the country since 2003, called the closure “a direct consequence of the political and legal framework established by the Georgian government, under which the foundation can no longer fulfil its core mission as a political foundation on the ground”.

It had worked in Georgia since 2002.

The legal basis is the Law on Grants as adopted on 4 March 2026, which widened the definition of a grant to financial and non-financial support that may influence domestic or foreign policy, made the government’s consent a condition of receiving one and set the penalties at a fine of twice the grant’s value or up to 6 years in prison. Both foundations’ applications were rejected under it on 28 July.

The Heinrich Böll and Friedrich Ebert foundations followed on Saturday, JAMnews reported, quoting a statement it did not attribute by name that “all four of our political foundations” in Georgia “have been forced to suspend their work following a decision by the Georgian government” after decades of support for the country’s European integration. The four are the foundations of the CDU, the SPD, the FDP and the Greens.

Papuashvili replied to the Naumann and Adenauer statements on 2 October: “judging by their statement, they apparently have no interest in academic, educational or other similar activities”.

The European liberals turned it into a sanctions question. The ALDE Party’s president Svenja Hahn and the European Liberal Forum’s president Jan-Christoph Oetjen wrote to the EU calling for “targeted sanctions against those responsible for repression and the systematic undermining of democracy” in Georgia.

Irakli Kirtskhalia of the ruling Georgian Dream replied on Saturday evening that the party had “little interest in their inept and completely baseless sanction packages” and that no sanction package could divert it from its course. Tbilisi mayor Kakha Kaladze added on Sunday that the letter “will have zero effect”.

The UK had put four Georgians on its sanctions list by name on 1 October, the kind of measure the liberals asked Brussels for. By Monday morning the government had answered the letter and not the list.

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