Georgians are going to the polls to decide whether to end 12 years of increasingly authoritarian rule, in a decisive vote on their push to join the European Union.
Some see this election as the most crucial vote since Georgians backed independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. “I voted for a new Georgia,” said pro-Western President Salome Zourabichvili.
The governing Georgian Dream party is widely expected to come first, but four opposition groups believe they can combine forces to remove it from power and revive Georgia’s EU process.
Putin managed to turn a referendum that would have been a clear 70/30 win a decade ago to a razor sharp 50/50 race. It’s frightening.