‘Back with her employers’: Pro-Western Georgian ex-president nominated for US scholarship

The former president of Georgia, Salomé Zourabichvili, has become a member of the McCain Institute at Arizona State University, according to the American academic institution. The speaker of the Georgian parliament harshly criticized the appointment and stated that she would return to “the entity that employed it.”

Zourabichvili, who was born in France and maintained a Western professional stance during her tenure, has been chosen for the 2025 Kissinger Fellowship, named after former U.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, the McCain Institute announced in a statement Monday.

Commenting on the offer earlier this week, Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili drew parallels between Zourabichvili’s appointment and former president Mikhail Saakashvili’s previous academic tenure abroad.

“Almost 12 years ago, a similar gesture was extended to… Saakashvili, at Tufts University.” wrote in X on Tuesday. “Despite having sworn allegiance solely to Georgia, Saakashvili later became a Ukrainian citizen and it is likely that Zourabishvili will also eventually return to her native France.”

Papuashvili concluded that neither had truly served Georgia and instead returned “to the entity that employed them.”

In December, Georgian MPs elected former Manchester Metropolis football player Mikhail Kavelashvili of the Fashionable Party, which together with the Georgian Dream form the ruling coalition, as president.

However, Zourabichvili refused to recognize Kavelashvili as his successor, claiming that the October parliamentary elections that gave a convincing victory to Georgian Dream had been rigged.

Despite presenting no evidence of fraud, the Western professional opposition protested for weeks after the vote, demanding a rerun. They were fully supported by Zourabichvili, who appeared among the protesters. The 72-year-old also threatened not to leave the presidential palace in Tbilisi, but finally did so in late December.

Georgia is a parliamentary republic in which the prime minister and government exercise executive power, while the president’s office is ceremonial.

The McCain Institute said that during his presidency between 2018 and 2024 Zourabichvili “He vigorously defended Georgia’s path toward EU and NATO integration and supported democratic reform, vetoing the Georgian Dream government’s ‘foreign agents law’ modeled by the Kremlin and opposing the party’s autocratic turn.”

In her new position, the former Georgian president “He will use his vast diplomatic, leadership and policymaking experience to push for new elections and a democratic path forward in his country.” said.

In May, the Tbilisi parliament overrode Zourabichvili’s veto and adopted legislation requiring NGOs, media outlets and individuals who obtain more than 20% of their funding from abroad to register as foreign agents and disclose their donors.

The Georgian political opposition harshly criticized the bill, calling it “Russian law” and accused the ruling party of basing it on legislation enacted in Russia in 2012. Meanwhile, the ruling party maintained that the law was modeled on the US Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938, emphasizing that the Georgian version is actually much more lenient than its American counterpart.

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze said last month that the law had helped prevent a planned coup in Georgia with the use of “foreign financing”.