The Georgia text, joint motion RC-B10-0443/2026 of 7 October by the EPP, S&D, Renew, ECR and Greens groups, is item 76 of Thursday’s agenda in its version of 15:38 on Wednesday. It condemns the attempt to outlaw the opposition parties, demands the immediate withdrawal of the constitutional claim, calls for the release of Elene Khoshtaria, Mzia Amaglobeli, Mikheil Saakashvili, Giorgi Baramidze and Nika Melia, and regrets “the persistent lack of action by the EU and most Member States” before repeating its call for targeted sanctions and visa bans on the four names. Both texts ask for sanctions that Parliament cannot impose, and Marta Kos has already said who sets the limit.
The claim the motion dates to November 2025 was filed anew on 24 September as case No. 1979 after the Federalists party was added in April and, in September, For Georgia, “the only opposition party still in parliament”, and the nine-month term from that filing runs to 24 June 2027, by JAMnews’s count. The recitals note that new judges were appointed to the Constitutional Court in September, which in the motion’s words raises serious doubts about their independence, and the last paragraph addresses the text to “the self-appointed authorities of Georgia”. Its one line on accession warns that any attempt to ban established parties “precludes any move towards EU accession”, and the words candidate status and visa-free appear nowhere in it.
Both texts ask for sanctions that Parliament cannot impose, and Marta Kos has already said who sets the limit.
Kos set out the limit on Wednesday. “We can only do as much as the member states are willing to do,” the enlargement commissioner told the Foreign Affairs Committee when Krzysztof Brejza asked whether the Commission would widen the suspension of visa-free travel beyond diplomatic and official passports and whether targeted sanctions had a realistic chance in the Council, InterPressNews reported at 16:36, and she said Georgia comes up at the Foreign Affairs Council next week.
In the evening debate David McAllister said the regime had taken “another drastic step toward authoritarianism” by trying to ban all major opposition parties, Małgorzata Gosiewska called it an attempt to establish an oligarchic dictatorship, and Rasa Juknevičienė said sanctions against Ivanishvili and those responsible are essential, as InterPressNews quoted them in reports stamped between 21:48 and 22:28 Tbilisi time.
Georgian Dream answered before the debate began. Those debating are the ones in whose hands these parties are a weapon against Georgia, Speaker Papuashvili said at midday, as the Georgian agency GHN carried it at 12:43, adding that members of parliament had used a constitutional right in applying to the Constitutional Court and that the parties cooperate with foreign forces and foreign special services. To Kos’s remark of Tuesday evening that Georgia is a candidate country only on paper and should stand at the level of Moldova and Ukraine, he said it is “better to be a candidate country merely on paper than a state merely on paper”, by InterPressNews at 12:21, and Kobakhidze said at 17:29 that if Moldova and Ukraine are ahead of Georgia in anything it is only in negative indicators.
The Azerbaijan motion, RC-B10-0438/2026 by the EPP, S&D, ECR, Renew, Greens and The Left, records Ali Karimli in pretrial detention since 29 November 2025, extended twice to 13 November 2026, on a charge of attempted violent seizure of power that he denies and that carries a potential life sentence, and Anar Mammadli sentenced on 7 September 2026 to 13 years, with the journalist Anar Abdullayev to 12. It counts over 300 political prisoners, Armenian prisoners among them, calls on the High Representative and the member states to prepare targeted measures under the EU Global Human Rights Sanctions Regime, makes any future partnership agreement conditional on releases, and regrets the Milli Majlis’s suspension of cooperation with Parliament.
The votes end Parliament’s part. Sanctions, under the human rights regime or any other, are the Council’s to adopt by unanimity, the enlargement reports Kos promised for the end of October are the Commission’s, and the Georgian court’s plenum sets its own timetable. Thursday adds two texts to Parliament’s resolutions of December 2024 and December 2025 on Azerbaijan and to its string of resolutions on Georgia, and the first body with power to act after them is the Council Kos named for next week.