President Zurabishvili pardons Nika Gvaramia

On 22 June Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili signed the act of pardoning prominent opposition media activist Nika Gvaramia, causing his immediate release from prison. The director-general of the opposition TV-channel Mtavari had been sentenced to 3.5 years in prison in May last year, on a charge of abuse of office that was widely regarded as politically motivated. Zurabishvili's decision came after the Supreme Court of Georgia decided to uphold Gvaramia's prison sentence on 19 June. The presidential pardon caused appreciation among Georgian opposition and civil society, while representatives of the governing Georgian Dream party criticized the decision. Georgia's Western partners lauded the pardoning, with President of the European Council Charles Michel calling it "an essential step towards depolarisation in Georgia".  

Diplomatic crisis between Georgia and Ukraine deepens amid new images of Georgia's imprisoned former President Saakashvili 

New footage of an emaciated Saakashvili appeared on 3 July, when the former President joined a court session via video link. The seemingly poor health condition of Saakashvili led Ukrainian President Zelensky to demand the immediate release of Saakashvili, who has Ukrainian citizenship. “Today, the world once again saw how the Kremlin - unfortunately, at the hands of the current Georgian government - is killing Ukrainian citizen Mykhailo Saakashvili,” Zelensky stated, using a Ukrainian variant of Saakashvili’s first name. In addition, the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned the Georgian ambassador to Ukraine, expressed strong protest and asked him to leave Ukraine within 48 hours to hold consultations with his capital. In return, Georgia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned the Ukrainian position, calling it "an extreme form of escalation”.  

LGBT pride week festival disrupted by protesters

The organizers of the LGBT pride week in Georgia were forced to call off a planned festivity on 8 July, after a large group of far-right and ultra-conservative aggressive protesters stormed the site of the event. According to eyewitnesses, the Georgian police did not engage the protesters, who were not forced to stop their march towards the site. Georgian government officials claimed that the group of protesters was too large in order for the police to stop the chaos. Officials from the US, EU and other Western partners criticized the violence, called for perpetrators to be legally held accountable and demanded a more effective protection of basic and human rights in Georgia. 

Former Minister of Education Armen Ashotyan detained

On 14 June, Armenian law enforcement took the Deputy President of Armenia's former ruling Republican Party, Armen Ashotyan, into a two-months pre-trial detention. Ashotyan allegedly violated bail restrictions in the context of an ongoing investigation around abuse of power during his tenure as Minister of Education. The investigators claim that Ashotyan is responsible for the embezzlement of more than 400.000 US-Dollar collected from membership fees of Yerevan State Medical University’s trade union and additionally blame him for allegedly causing a financial damage of more than 100.000 US-Dollar while being Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the university. Ashotyan, his lawyers, as well as leading Armenian opposition figures and European partners deny the charges and describe them as politically motivated, demanding his immediate release.

Path towards Armenian-Azerbaijani peace agreement appears to remain rocky after another round of US-hosted talks 
Armenian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ararat Mirzoyan, and his Azerbaijani counterpart, Jeyhun Bayramov, came together in Washington between 27 and 29 June for another round of negotiations regarding a possible peace agreement between both countries. The negotiations were overshadowed by the death of four Armenian soldiers amid Azerbaijani artillery strikes in Nagorno-Karabakh on 28 June. U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken cited some progress on certain matters but did not provide any details. He further stated that "there remains hard work to be done to try to reach a final agreement". This constitutes a remarkable change of tone compared to the previous meeting in the beginning of May, after which Blinken notably claimed "tangible progress" between both parties and a peace agreement being "within sight".  

International attention on Armenian-American steel plant after it comes under Azerbaijani fire
The construction of a new steel plant, initiiated as a joint project of Armenian and US-American investors, appeared in international spotlight after Azerbaijani military forces on 14 June fired at the construction site in the Armenian village of Yeraskh, bordering Azerbaijan's Nakhichevan exclave. The shelling seriously wounded two construction workers, who are citizens of India. Despite the incident, the construction works at the steel plant continue. On 20 June, large Armenian and US-American flags were raised on the territory of the plant. The site targeted by Azerbaijani forces is an Armenian-American project worth 70 Million US-Dollar. It is expected to produce 180.000 tons of steel per year once operational and thus potentially becoming a substantial factor in the Armenian economy.

Massive crackdown on environmental protests in the village of Soyudlu

Soyudlu, a small settlement in western Azerbaijan, has been put under lockdown by state authorities. This drastic measure comes after local residents protested against the plan of a gold mining company to build a hazardous artificial lake in the village in order to discharge toxic waste. On 20-21 June, Azerbaijani police cracked down on the protests with significant force, deploying tear gas against the protesters, including on elderly women, which sparked outrage on Azerbaijani social media. The crackdown resulted in at least 20 injured protesters, five residents were detained and sentenced to 20 days in jail. While the government acknowledged mistakes of some police officers and appointed a commission to assess the situation with the lake, entrance to the village remains heavily restricted, and people who speak out in favor of the protests and against police violence continue to be arrested. 

Baku announced a temporary closure of the Lachin corridor, the only route linking Armenia with Nagorno-Karabakh, on 11 July. Justifying this action, the Azerbaijani State Border authorities claim to have found smuggled non-humanitarian goods such as mobile phones and cigarettes in Red Cross vehicles coming from Armenia. The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) rejected these allegations, stating that "no unauthorized material has been found in any vehicle belonging to the ICRC". However, the ICRC also admitted that several drivers tried, without the knowledge of ICRC, to carry commercial goods in cars that temporarily displayed the ICRC logo. "These individuals were not ICRC staff members and their service contracts were immediately terminated", the Red Cross stated. The complete restriction of access from Armenia exacerbates the humanitarian crisis in Nagorno-Karabakh, which has already been under de-facto blockade by Azerbaijan since December 2022, with limited access only for the ICRC and Russian troops stationed in the region.  

 
Azerbaijan deepens coordination with Kazakhstan and Georgia on "Middle Corridor"
A visit by Kazakh Prime Minister Alikhan Smailov to the South Caucasus in the End of June aimed at setting up a jointly run and owned logistics company between Azerbaijan, Georgia and Kazakhstan. As an effort to harmonize cargo handling and ease customs processes, the agreement intends to strenghten the "Middle Corridor", the transport route between China and Europe bypassing Russia. One of the main factors limiting the potential of the "Middle Corridor" has so far been that cargo must cross several national borders. The Azerbaijani-Georgian-Kazakh logistics company is envisioned as a tool tackling this problem. Yet, officials from all three countries noted that in order to ramp up the amount of transported goods and reduce bottlenecks, significant investments in infrastructure are required in the South Caucasus.