[Congressional Record Volume 162, Number 62 (Thursday, April 21, 2016)]
[House]
[Pages H1915-H1916]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                          REPUBLIC OF GEORGIA

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 6, 2015, the gentleman from Oklahoma (Mr. Russell) is 
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the majority leader.
  Mr. RUSSELL. Mr. Speaker, in October of this year, the Republic of 
Georgia will hold elections. More than just an election to determine 
its national leadership, this election will likely determine whether 
the Republic of Georgia remains a semi-free country that will continue 
on a path to self-determination or whether it will succumb to 
corruption, Russian oligarch influence, and Russian domination.
  Georgia has a long history of fighting to protect its identity 
against evil tyrants, bullying neighbors, corrupted officials, and 
outright invasion. A small but important nation with its distinct 
language and people, Georgian territory forms a vital land bridge 
between Eastern Europe and West Asia that is nestled on the Black Sea. 
With the exception of her neighbor Armenia, much of her history has 
been fighting for survival against her neighbors wanting to force her 
into Russian, Turkish, or Persian domination.
  Since Georgia's reassertion of independence from her Russian masters 
in 1991, her struggle has not been easy. Balanced between a crumbling 
Soviet Union and internal unrest, Georgia emerged from several years of 
civil strife to defend her independence. Georgia saw her first 
President, Zviad Gamsakhurdia, ousted by Russian-backed leaders, such 
as Eduard Shevardnadze. During attempts to restore elected government, 
President Gamsakhurdia later would lose his life in still mysterious 
circumstances.
  After a period of domination by Russian-backed forces and political 
leaders, the nascent Republic of Georgia strove for great reforms in 
the Rose Revolution of 2003, finally breaking her chains and setting a 
path toward self-determination. The United States and the international 
community embraced

[[Page H1916]]

this effort, and global monitors affirmed the legitimate vote of the 
people that exposed the corruption of the election results.

                              {time}  1200

  Shevardnadze's government attempted to ignore the true results, but 
the Georgian people had a different plan and peacefully forced 
Shevardnadze to succumb to the will of the people as they stormed the 
parliament with roses. It was one of the most inspirational episodes of 
freedom in world history.
  Since then, Georgia has enjoyed a period of self-determination, 
Western engagement, human rights improvements, and trade. This has not 
been without cost. Separatists in the Georgian districts of Ossetia and 
Abkhazia, encouraged by Moscow, cast the Republic of Georgia into 
turmoil. Russia used this unrest as pretext to invade Georgia and still 
occupies these territories while denouncing earlier agreements to close 
Russian bases on Georgia's Black Sea coast.
  Still, President Mikheil Saakashvili was able to take his rightful 
place as the duly elected President of Georgia, and his reforms brought 
Georgia from a backward status in the world to a much improved 
financial structure, with marked increases in economic growth and 
foreign investment.
  For all of Georgia's struggles, for all of her self-determination, 
outside neighbors once again are vying to make Georgia subservient to 
their wishes. Russia has been stung by free peoples in independent 
states that she once dominated in the Soviet era that now choose 
instead to preserve their language, culture, history, and restore their 
freedom.
  Russia, for its part, has done everything in its power to force these 
peoples back into a serf status. Whether in Crimea, Ukraine, the Baltic 
States, or Georgia, the pattern has been the same.
  Russia's playbook starts with flooding opposition groups with cash 
from oligarchs loyal to Moscow. Separatists are courted in areas with 
some Russian ethnicity and then encouraged to foment division against 
these struggling republics, demanding their rights for Russian peoples 
in these territories.
  Russia then aids militias to create violence that strains the local 
political and law enforcement structure, causing the people living 
there to wish for anything--even the bad old days--to somehow restore 
order.
  Then national political parties are infiltrated and flushed with 
oligarch cash and promises of power as they convert legitimate 
parliaments into calls for pro-Moscow governance that, in essence, 
become nothing more than the old Soviet Socialist structure ruled by 
Moscow.
  In Georgia, it has been no different. Despite Georgia casting off 
outside invaders and attempting to push off the chains of Russia in the 
early 1800s or in 1918 or in 1991, Russia somehow feels it is her right 
to treat Georgians as a subclass of human beings that only exist to 
serve the interests of Moscow and her territory should only merely be a 
transitway for Russian interests.
  After the successful removal of Russian chains in the Rose Revolution 
in 2003, Russia has continually bullied Georgia's political system, 
fomented unrest in Abkhazia and Ossetia, invaded Georgia, and violated 
her agreement to withdraw from bases in Georgian territory. Amazingly, 
through all of this, Georgia has remained resolute.
  So, in classic form, Russia has moved to infiltrate the political 
process in the hopes of creating its own pro-Moscow government in the 
Georgian capital to hand them everything on a silver political platter.
  Chief among the funding efforts and political infiltration is 
oligarch Bidzina Ivanishvili, a close ally of Vladimir Putin. The aim 
is to rig votes along the same lines as was attempted in 2003 by buying 
votes, punishing political opponents, using Georgia's own 
administrative and political resources to influence the elections while 
using Georgian special forces to influence the outcomes.
  Combined with the full privatization of the election commissions, who 
one source estimates is now 98 percent controlled by Ivanishvili, the 
Georgian people face an alarming prospect in their right to free 
elections in October of this year.
  Faced with such bullying, the Georgian people are looking to the 
world for support. It is somehow fitting, Mr. Speaker, that this 
Saturday marks St. George's Day in world history.
  St. George, the Christian martyr and mythical slayer of dragons, is 
the namesake from whom the country of Georgia takes its name, according 
to some legends.
  The Georgian people are willing to slay this political dragon and 
stand for their freedom as they have before, but they need our help.
  We can ignore their pleas--after all, most Americans don't even know 
where Georgia is on the map--or we can give them a megaphone to shout 
their message, and the message is this: They wish to remain free.
  Here are some simple steps that we, in our country, can take: We call 
on the President of the United States to assist in monitoring of this 
fall's election processes in Georgia, as we once assisted them in the 
pivotal 2003 elections.
  We call upon the Georgian electoral commissions to be restored to 
representative membership to counter the private buyout being conducted 
by Moscow and their proxy, oligarch Bidzina Ivanishvili.
  We call upon the United States Department of Treasury and Western 
banks to freeze the assets of Ivanishvili for violations as an illegal 
arms trader.
  We call upon the State Department to flag Georgian officials and 
business leaders who are discovered to be complicit in tampering with 
free elections to have their visas revoked and their assets frozen.
  We also call upon Western journalists in our free press to give the 
Georgian people a chance to have their story heard by investigating and 
covering the remaining few months of what could be the last free months 
of a Republic of Georgia.
  Finally, we call upon the self-determined, free, and resolute people 
of Georgia to stand in the spirit of St. George.
  Hold your head high, grasp the lance, and pierce the attacking 
dragon. You have been threatened before. By your commitment, as in 
2003, you can show the world again that freedom will not succumb to 
corruption and intimidation.
  The people of Georgia should also know the God of the universe does 
not slumber. We, the people of the United States, join with the people 
of Georgia in our prayers for your freedom.
  Mr. Speaker, I yield back my time.

                          ____________________