TIFLIDA. A large peaceful demonstration in downtown Tbilisi was violently broken up by police early yesterday morning, hours after the Putin government-inspired “foreign agents law” was passed. The demonstrations were repeated last night, for a second day, with just as much participation and a demand for the repeal of a law deemed to threaten freedom of the press and individual liberties.

Thousands of citizens expressed their opposition to the law on Tuesday evening, many of them carrying the flags of the European Union, the United States and Ukraine. Loudspeakers at the rally played the anthems of Georgia as well as Ukraine as the protesters declared their support for Kyiv.

“No to Russian law” was the main slogan of the march that ended in front of the Tbilisi parliament. Although the protesters remained peaceful, police used water pumps and tear gas to disperse the crowd in the parliament courtyard. Shortly after 11 p.m., when clashes broke out between protesters and police, a Molotov cocktail fire broke out near the parliament building, according to a response from Le Monde newspaper.

“This is a disproportionate use of repressive force. Peaceful protest is a democratic right. The protesters stood aside from the police, who fired tear gas at them as Parliament passed a law restricting the right to protest,” Jabba Devtariani, a former diplomat, tweeted.

The legislation “on agents of foreign powers” ​​is reminiscent of the Russian Putin era and is causing a political crisis in the country.

In a plenary session of parliament on Tuesday, the ruling majority approved in principle the law on agents of foreign powers, which its critics say represents an authoritarian turn on the country’s political scene. The bill, introduced by the ruling Georgian Dream party, requires all organizations with more than 20% foreign funding to be registered as “agents of foreign powers.” The law is identical to a 2012 Russian law that the Kremlin used to undermine civil society organizations, suppress the media and eliminate any opposition voice.

“You are all pro-Russian traitors,” opposition spokeswoman Ana Cilice denounced the coalition from the parliament hall. A few hours earlier, during a discussion of the bill, the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee and a member of the ruling party, Anri Okanasvili, slapped the leader of the united opposition.

The political crisis is also caused by the public position of the country’s president, Salomi Zurabisvili, appointed by the ruling party, against the controversial bill: “This law threatens Georgia’s European perspective.”