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Excerpt from www.sightmagazine.com.au
Thousands of Georgians led by Orthodox Christian clerics marked “Family Purity Day” on Friday, marching down the same central avenue in Tbilisi that has been the scene of some of the fiercest anti-government protests in the country’s history.
The contrasting groups staging the marches – pro-Orthodox and conservative on one side and pro-European on the other – spotlight the deep divisions within Georgian society as it grapples with an unprecedented political crisis.
For over a month, thousands of protesters, many of them young people, have filled Tbilisi’s streets on a near-nightly basis to voice their opposition to a draft law on “foreign agents” they condemn as authoritarian and Russian-inspired.
The United States and the European Union have repeatedly warned the ruling Georgian Dream party to drop the bill, which protesters fear will harm the South Caucasus country’s bid to join the European Union.
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