Tbilisi: The Russians, who opposed the invasion of Ukraine and have been moving towards the South Caucasus region are being denied entry into Georgia as reported by the local activists in the region. More than a dozen Russian citizens are being barred from entering the country every day, told Yegor Kuroptev, the director of the Free Russia Foundation in the South Caucasus.
The major motive behind this is the general desire to limit the flow of Russian citizens, as Kuroptev stated.
Many Russians, including journalists, activists and opposition politicians, who are prone to political repression or conscription at home, owing to their anti-war ideologies. Georgia has sporadically barred the entry of Russians into its territory for years. But the number of blocked entries are increasing day by day.
A Russian journalist and media manager Mitya Aleshkovsky, who had moved to Tbilisi earlier this year, have been deported. Moreover, the reason and no official explanation of the move had been given, as per his historian mother Tamara Eidelman’s Facebook post.
Another photojournalist from Russia, Vasily Krestyaninov, was also refused entry to Georgia twice in less than two weeks.
Kuroptev stated that the main issue in the deportations of the anti-war Russians is the lack of transparency. The deported Russians aren’t even aware of the reason of them being deported.
Moreover, there is uncertainty regarding which documents would facilitate the entry inside Georgia, stating, “Border control is quite random”.
Till now, 300,000 Russians are known to have successfully crossed the Georgian border after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
