By Felix Light
(Reuters) – Two French journalists have been refused entry to Georgia in recent months, press freedom advocacy group Reporters Without Borders (RSF) said, as the South Caucasus country takes what critics call an authoritarian and pro-Russian turn.
RSF said that the two journalists, who it named as freelance photojournalist Jerome Chobeaux and Clement Girardot, a reporter who has worked for Le Monde and Al Jazeera, had been denied entry to Georgia at Tbilisi airport in March and February respectively.
Georgia’s interior ministry and border police did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Both journalists had covered street protests and a crackdown that came after Georgia’s October parliamentary election, which opposition supporters say was rigged.
The journalists did not immediately respond to requests for comment. RSF cited them as saying Georgian border guards had offered no explanation for their expulsions.
Georgian authorities say the poll, which saw the ruling Georgian Dream party retain power, was free and fair.
Georgian media have reported that several other foreigners, including some long-term residents of Georgia, have been denied entry to the country since the election. Some have linked their entry bans to having attended anti-government protests.
In the run-up to the vote, two other Western reporters, one from Switzerland and another from Czechia, were denied entry to the country.
Since the outbreak of war in Ukraine, Georgian border guards have repeatedly denied entry to Russian critics of the Kremlin, including journalists, cultural figures and allies of the late opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
Traditionally among the most democratic and pro-Western of the Soviet Union’s successor states, Georgia has since the start of the war in Ukraine deepened ties with Russia, blaming Kyiv and its Western backers for the conflict.
The shift in policy, which has included a draconian law on “foreign agents”, curbs on LGBT rights, and the freezing of Georgia’s long-standing European Union membership bid, is widely seen as spearheaded by billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili, an ex-prime minister regarded as the country’s de facto leader.
Protests against the halt to talks on EU membership, a long-held national goal that is broadly popular among Georgians, have been ongoing since November.
(Reporting by Felix Light; Editing by Ros Russell)
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