Russia and the South Caucasus: Agendas, Priorities and Realities - 2019: Page 2 of 9

recognition of "new political realities" in the person of the "independent" Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The degree of discontent within the society grew and gradually reached a critical level ... It must be well understood that there is absolute consensus regarding the issue of occupation in the Georgian society. Even the position of the “pro-Russian” political forces (in Georgia - Editor) is that we should not fight, but settle, and then Moscow will return everything. By the way, this position differs from the position of the "anti-Russian" forces only partly, since the latter do not believe in the possibility of reaching an agreement with the current authorities. Thus, the case of Gavrilov was only the trigger, but such a development was inevitable. Well, the so-called "Gavrilov’s night" shifted all events into the domestic political format.

Andrey Areshev – ... As a Russian politician said a year ago, "... if the Georgian side wants to develop relations, we are ready for this, we have talked about it many times. If they don’t want it, it is just fine, so no need." So in this regard, it seems the approach was and will be pragmatic, with specific conditions, of course.

Gela Vasadze – But what about the “If they don’t want it, it is just fine, so no need” part? A Russian politician bent the truth here a little. Let's be pragmatic, let's look at the structure of the Russian business in Georgia and its importance for Russia. I'm not talking about the personal interests of individual influential citizens, this topic is no less interesting. Why are Georgian authorities (both incumbent and former) not using the real levers they have? The question is extremely interesting. And here there really are no complaints against the Russian authorities ... Regarding the suffering business and tourism. Here, as it often happens, the devil lurks in the details. And the details are numbers. Recently, I have multiply seen absolutely wild assessments of the damage to tourism that I even doubted it myself. The data of the State Statistical Committee and the assessments of both independent financial institutions and the government, which really wanted to write off their mistakes for the crisis, confirmed that there is no serious damage to the economy ... There is damage to specific people who focused on working with Russian tourists, and the damage they incur is really serious. I feel sorry for the people; ironically, they were the ones who contributed to the restoration of Russian-Georgian relations.

Laura Baghdasaryan - The loyal attitude of the Georgian political establishment and society as a whole towards cooperation between Georgia and Russia in a number of areas, except politics, is a distinctive feature. However, at the same time, Russia and Russian issues are turning into a mobilizing domestic theme for Georgia. When references are made to the mood of the Georgian society, I get an impression that these references play an exclusively domestic and foreign policy function.

The phenomenon of public sentiments in June 2019 clearly demonstrated the duality of the situation in Georgia. By the