Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili says he signed the divisive "foreign agent" law that sparked weeks of mass protests and threatened the Caucasian country's path to North Atlantic integration.
Georgia's pro-Western President Salome Zourabishvili, who vetoed the law passed last month, refused to support it after it was returned to her following a parliamentary vote that overrode her veto.
According to Georgia's constitution, if the president refuses to approve a law after her veto is overridden by lawmakers, it is up to the speaker of parliament to promulgate it.
Under the law, which has been widely criticized as modeled after a similar Russian law used by the Kremlin to crack down on dissent and stifle democratic opposition, non-governmental organizations that receive more than 20 percent of their funding from abroad must register as agents of foreign influence.
"Emotions have subsided and many citizens who joined the protest of the radical opposition have already realized that, in fact, the law on transparency will increase the responsibility of non-governmental associations and their financiers, improve the political system, weaken disinformation, reduce radicalism and polarization," Papuashvili said. announcing the move at a briefing in parliament.
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