issue#1523

Issue no: 1523

• OCTOBER 17 - 23, 2025 • PUBLISHED WEEKLY

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In this week’s issue...

OSCE Chair Valtonen Fined in Georgia after Urging Democratic Reform and Civil Society Protections NEWS PAGE 2

Ukraine Latest: Winter Closes In as Ukraine’s War Becomes a Battle of Endurance, Drones, and Blackouts POLITICS PAGE 3

Parliament Backs Bill Banning Specific Individuals from Political Activity and Elections POLITICS PAGE 5

From Family Farming to Commercial Partnerships with HoReCa

Simon Leviev Fights Back: Lawyers Slam German Extradition Request as 'Unfair and Weak'

BUSINESS PAGE 6

Sakartvelo’s AlphaGeneration Coming of Age SOCIETY PAGE 9

INTERVIEW BY TEAM GT

Empire in Soft Focus: Madama Butterfly in Tbilisi

S

imon Leviev, born Shimon Hayut in Israel, first attracted international attention in 2019 when he was accused of defrauding several women across Europe after having met them on dating apps. His alleged method — posing as a wealthy heir to the diamond trade — was the subject of the 2022 Netflix documentary The Tinder Swindler.

He has consistently denied any wrongdoing, arguing that his relationships were consensual and that the documentary presented a distorted and exaggerated picture of his life. Leviev previously served a brief prison sentence in Israel on unrelated charges of fraud and forgery. Since his release, he has sought to rebrand himself as a businessman and media personality.

Yet Simon Leviev is now facing a very different kind of scrutiny. Detained in late September in Batumi, Georgia, he awaits a court decision on a German extradition request related to alleged fraud amounting to €40,000. If granted, the extradition could see him facing up to 10 years in prison in Germany.

Continued on page 4

CULTURE PAGE 10

Aesthetic Practice in Times of Global Turmoil CULTURE PAGE 11 Prepared for Georgia Today Business by

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Simon Leviev, "The Tinder Swindler." Source: Netfix

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2

NEWS

GEORGIA TODAY

OCTOBER 17 - 23, 2025

OSCE Chair Valtonen Fined in Georgia after Urging Democratic Reform and Civil Society Protections

BY TEAM GT A rally in March in Tbilisi. Source: GT

Parliament Approves Bill Tightening Rules on Rallies and Demonstrations in First Reading

BY TEAM GT

T

he Georgian Parliament has approved, in its first reading, a legislative package that further tightens regulations related to rallies and demonstrations.

The amendments to the Criminal Code and the Code of Administrative Offenses are being reviewed under an expedited procedure. The final consideration and adoption in the second and third readings are scheduled for the October 16 plenary session.

Based on the draft law, participants in rallies or demonstrations who cover their faces with masks, carry tear gas or toxic substances, block roads, or set up temporary constructions will face administrative detention of up to 15 days for a first offense. If the violator is an organ-

izer of the protest, the penalty increases to up to 20 days.

Participation in a rally or demonstration that is subject to termination at the request of the Ministry of Internal Affairs will result in administrative detention of up to 60 days for a first offense. The same penalty will apply to any individual carrying weapons, pyrotechnics, or other objects that could endanger the life or health of others during a gathering.

Repeated violations of these rules will lead to criminal prosecution — punishable by up to one year in prison for a second offense, and up to two years for subsequent violations.

In addition, a new article will be added to the Criminal Code, introducing criminal liability for individuals who, for the third time, insult a law enforcement officer or disobey a lawful order.

The legislative package was authored and initiated by Georgian Dream lawmakers.

O

n an official visit to Georgia this week, OSCE Chairperson-in-Office and Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen underscored the importance of democratic resilience, protections for civil society, and sustained international engagement in conflict resolution.

According to an official OSCE statement, Valtonen met with Georgian Foreign Minister Maka Bochorishvili, representatives of civil society organizations, and independent analytical centers. She also visited the administrative boundary line, where she addressed the ongoing impact of the 2008 war.

“Addressing the concerns of people living near the dividing line requires sustained attention from the international community to the conflict context,” Valtonen said, highlighting the continued work of the OSCE’s Special Representative for the South Caucasus, Ambassador Christoph Späth.

Valtonen voiced concern over recent legislation and political developments in Georgia that have drawn criticism from OSCE participating states. She stressed the need to safeguard the role of journalists, NGOs, and human rights

OSCE Chairperson-in-Office and Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen. Source: APA

defenders, calling them “the lifeblood of democratic resilience.”

“They confront injustice, drive innovation, and hold those in power accountable. Their voices must not only be heard but also protected,” she said. “The Georgian government must find a way out of the crisis and restore public trust in its democratic institutions.”

She reaffirmed the OSCE’s support for Georgia’s democratic development and its commitments under international agreements, while also backing key OSCE mechanisms such as the Geneva International Discussions and the Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism.

The visit, intended to promote dialogue

and cooperation, was overshadowed by a diplomatic controversy after a planned meeting between Valtonen and Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze was abruptly canceled. The Georgian government claimed it had canceled the meeting in response to Valtonen’s alleged participation in an “illegal rally” and her making of “false statements.”

The Ministry of Internal Affairs of Georgia later confirmed it had fined Valtonen 5,000 GEL for allegedly blocking traffic on Rustaveli Avenue during her visit to a protest near the Parliament on October 14, where she spoke with demonstrators.

However, Valtonen told Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat that it was Finland that canceled the meeting due to a scheduling change involving Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev. “I was in Georgia to observe the demonstrations that have been taking place for weeks and months. I wanted to express my support for freedom of speech,” she explained.

Valtonen later traveled to Azerbaijan, where she met with President Aliyev and Foreign Minister Jeyhun Bayramov as part of her broader South Caucasus tour.

The incident has drawn international attention, highlighting the growing sensitivity surrounding foreign engagement and civic freedoms in Georgia.

“TEXTERE”: Rediscovered Five New Solar Power Plants Join Georgia’s Energy Grid Soviet Textiles Meet Memory and Art at Tbilisi’s Silk Museum

BY TEAM GT

T Solar panels. Source: Flux Connectivity

BY MARIAM RAZMADZE

G

eorgia has officially added five small solar power plants to its national energy system this year, the first of their kind in the country, with a combined installed capacity of 10 megawatts.

The facilities, developed by ‘Alazani Solar’ and ‘Kakheti Solar’, are located across the Dedoplistskaro, Sighnaghi and Akhmeta municipalities in the Kakheti region. Each solar plant spans three to four hectares.

As Nino Mchedlishvili, director of both companies, stated, the project took two years from concept to completion, including nearly a year of preliminary research.

“Excluding the net stations, this was our first project of this kind. In total, it took two years to implement,” Mchedlishvili told BMG TV. She mentioned that Kakheti was chosen due to its natural potential for solar energy and the relative scarcity of local power generation facilities. The sites were selected carefully to minimize agricultural impact and ensure proximity to substations, reducing transmission losses.

The Ministry of Economy confirmed in July that the Georgian State Electrosystem had connected all five plants to the national grid. The government continues to prioritize renewable energy integration, with an additional 125 MW of wind power currently under construction, representing an investment of $195 million.

Peskov: Russia Will Not Comply with European Court Ruling on Compensation to Georgia

BY TEAM GT

R

ussia will not comply with the European Court of Human Rights’ (ECHR) decision ordering Moscow to pay compensation to Georgia, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said during a briefing on Tuesday.

“We will not implement this decision,”

Peskov stated.

When asked whether the payment could help improve relations between Russia and Georgia, Peskov said that “this is a separate issue.”

Georgia’s Ministry of Justice reported that on October 14, 2025, the ECHR had announced its decision in the Georgia v. Russia (IV) case, also known as the “ongoing occupation” case. The Court ruled that Russia must pay more than €253 million in compensation to Georgia.

he State Silk Museum in Tbilisi will open its temporary exhibition “TEXTERE” on October 19, offering visitors a unique journey through history, memory, and material.

The exhibition will be on view until December 20, in the museum’s temporary exhibition hall.

The show presents a sketch-like introduction to the museum’s collection of industrial fabrics, featuring samples of Soviet textiles produced at the Tbilisi Silk Weaving Factory between the 1950s and 1990s. Many of these pieces had remained stored in the museum’s attic for decades and were rediscovered during the pandemic in 2021. This archival material became the basis for artistic and curatorial research, inspiring a range of creative initiatives.

Among the featured projects is the research of artist Nino Kvrivishvili, who explores the Tbilisi Silk Weaving Factory and the lives of the people who worked in the textile industry. Her work examines the interconnection between memory, labor, individual lives, and material, giving the historical fabrics new meaning and relevance.

The exhibition also introduces Guram Tsibakhashvili’s authorial project “Once” to the museum for the first time. Inspired by an archive of old postcards, the project captures the relationship between memory and time, much like the industrial textile samples themselves. Additionally, a special letter corner invites visitors to creatively share their own stories and recollections, making the exhibition an interactive platform of exchange.

“TEXTERE” continues the museum’s exploration of the theme of “lost and found”, asking how we analyze collective and individual memory and how we

imagine the tactile experience of a specific historical epoch. Here, textures transform into both physical and emotional matter, carrying time, labor, and memories interwoven between objects.

Curated under the supervision of Mariam Shergelashvili, the exhibition is realized as part of the museum’s ongoing exhibition internship program, featuring contributions from interns Nini Bekauri, Anano Gogichadze, Ninutsa Lekishvili,

Nini Mamuladze, and Sali Khizanishvili.

Visitors can experience the exhibition from October 19 to December 20, with the opening event scheduled from 17:00 to 19:00 at 6 Tsabadze Street.

“TEXTERE” invites audiences to step into a space where fabric becomes a living archive of memory and creativity, bridging the past with the present through the tactile and emotional dimensions of material culture.

POLITICS

GEORGIA TODAY OCTOBER 17 - 23, 2025

3

Ukraine Latest: Winter Closes In as Ukraine’s War Becomes a Battle of Endurance, Drones, and Blackouts COMPILED BY ANA DUMBADZE

T

he war in Ukraine is entering a new phase — slower, more punishing, and increasingly shaped by drones, power cuts, and long-range strikes rather than sweeping offensives. Neither side is making big moves on the ground, but the intensity of the fighting is growing, and the human cost is mounting by the day.

This week, Ukrainian military intelligence (HUR) revealed that at least 1,076 Cuban nationals have fought or are currently fighting alongside Russian forces in Ukraine. Of these, 96 are confirmed dead or missing in action. Recruitment tactics reportedly involve luring fighters with promises of construction work via social media, arranging travel via intermediaries, and issuing tourist or work visas through Russian diplomatic channels. The recruits allegedly undergo only two weeks of training at the Avangard Center in Moscow Oblast before being sent to frontline positions. The revelation tracks the lower end of a previous US estimate that put the number of Cubans fighting for Russia between 1,000 and 5,000.

On the diplomatic and military aid front, several European nations have taken significant steps over recent days.

Denmark promised $171 million in assistance, earmarked for naval needs, tank repairs, training, fuel, and rehabilitation in frontline zones. Sweden laid out plans to contribute radar-reconnaissance and early warning aircraft, potentially paving the way for deployment of Swedish Gripen fighters. Germany pledged a new package worth more than 2 billion euros (about $2.3 billion), which includes air defense systems such as Patriot and

IRIS-T, precision munitions, secure communications, anti-tank weapons, and small arms. Half a billion dollars of that total will flow through NATO’s PURL (Prioritized Ukraine Requirements List) initiative. Finland and Lithuania formally joined PURL, offering financial support—$30 million from Lithuania—while the Netherlands unveiled a 90 million-euro package for drone production, and Estonia prepared fresh drone deliveries.

Simultaneously, Ukraine intensified its outreach to US defense firms. A highlevel delegation, including President Zelensky’s top aides and ministers, held meetings with Raytheon and Lockheed Martin to discuss deliveries of systems such as Tomahawk cruise missiles. A senior NATO official confirmed that inbound Tomahawks would greatly expand Ukraine’s deep-strike capacity.

The Kremlin has responded with threats of escalation, though many analysts believe Russia will rely on rhetorical deterrence rather than direct confrontation with NATO. On the battlefield, the tempo of ground operations remained relatively modest this week, but the shadow war of drones, missiles, and attritional strikes on energy infrastructure has grown fiercer. Russia has shifted its posture from broad offensives to precision drone and glide bomb strikes aimed at rail, power, and gas infrastructure.

“Russia timed its recent assault on Ukraine’s energy infrastructure to coincide with poor weather, which reduced the effectiveness of Ukraine’s air defenses by 20 30 %,” said President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Since mid-2025, Moscow has escalated attacks on Ukraine’s railway lines using upgraded drones with real-time video feedback, targeting locomotives and high-value nodes to disrupt supply and

A fire at the site of a drone attack in the Odesa region of Ukraine, October 9. Source: Ukrainian Emergency Services via AFP

aid lines. The number of such sorties has jumped from one per week to as many as ten.

This week, Ukraine launched a major counter-strike across Russian territory, hitting a Sverdlov ammunition plant in the Nizhny Novgorod region, an oil terminal in occupied Crimea, and a Russian 18th Combined Arms Army ammunition depot. Moscow claimed to have shot down 251 Ukrainian drones across 14 regions. The strikes show Kyiv’s growing capacity for long-range retaliation, relying entirely on domestically produced systems.

Moscow’s countermeasure has been its most aggressive energy campaign yet.

In its largest attack to date, Russian forces launched 381 drones and 35 missiles against Ukraine’s natural gas extraction and processing facilities in Kharkiv and Poltava. Local officials described the assault as a deliberate campaign of terror designed to deprive civilians of heat and power this winter. The resulting damage forced emergency power cuts nationwide, with Ukraine instituting scheduled outages in all but two regions.

Over 1.9 million users have had power restored through rapid repairs, but many

remain in the dark as winter looms.

Ukraine's response now hinges on additional air defense systems, emergency energy imports, and support to restore its gas reserve capacities.

The assault wave reached even Russia’s interior. A drone struck the Ufaorgsintez refinery in Bashkortostan—over 1,300 kilometers from the frontline—triggering fires and disrupting mobile networks.

In Russian-occupied Crimea, Ukraine’s drones hit the Feodosia Morskoi Neftianoi Terminal, damaging sixteen fuel tanks.

Continued on page 5

4

POLITICS

GEORGIA TODAY

OCTOBER 17 - 23, 2025

Simon Leviev Fights Back: Lawyers Slam German Extradition Request as 'Unfair and Weak' Continued from page 1 For now, Leviev is being held in a detention facility in Kutaisi, where his lawyers say conditions are difficult. But his legal defense is taking shape, formally appointed to represent him in the ongoing proceedings: Sharon Nahari, one of Israel’s foremost experts in white-collar crime and extradition cases, and Mariam Kublashvili, a prominent Georgian lawyer known for her high-profile criminal defense work.

Both have made clear that they intend to contest the extradition vigorously.

“Our defense is clear,” says Nahari.

“The German request is disproportionate, based on weak evidence, and Mr Leviev denies the allegations entirely.

There are also serious concerns regarding the statute of limitations. He has always appeared for, and cooperated with, investigations across Europe. To arrest him in a third country, rather than addressing the matter openly through Israel, is unfair and unacceptable.”

Kublashvili, meanwhile, describes the nature of their work as both legal and reputational.

“We have obtained the case materials and are working intensively,” she says.

“We visited him in prison on Monday and he told us the following: ‘I have absolutely no recollection of any of this.

I’m not claiming to be an angel, but I genuinely don’t remember anything of the sort — especially given how little evidence has been presented. Under the

circumstances, I believe I’m either being set up, or there’s been some kind of misunderstanding. I am living an entirely different life now, and have been doing so for more than five years.”

According to Kublashvili, the case must be viewed in context — one that includes the media attention that has followed Leviev since the 2022 release of The Tinder Swindler.

“Given the sensitive nature of the case, and the fact that he has become a globally recognized figure — even the subject of a Netflix documentary — what we have witnessed is an extremely biased and skewed media narrative,” she says.

“We need to remember that he is a very different person now. Since 2022, he has embarked on a new, entirely legal career, and has even published a memoir. In some ways, his story reminds me of Jordan Belfort’s: a man who turned over a new leaf and went on to become a highly sought-after motivational speaker. There are many other such examples. Simon hopes to follow a similar path.”

Kublashvili was asked about Leviev’s personal circumstances in custody, which are allegedly “challenging.”

“My client is being held in conditions that lack even the most basic standards of hygiene,” she says. “And since none of the staff speak English, he can’t make himself understood. I will do my utmost to have him transferred to Tbilisi, where the conditions are somewhat better — I have already applied for his transfer.”

For now, she adds, Leviev is trying to

Leviev's lawyers Sharon Nahari and Mariam Kublashvili. Source: GT

keep himself busy, requesting books and notes, including a copy of his own memoir, which he reportedly intends to revise while in detention.

Nahari, meanwhile, stresses that the case itself — stripped of media narratives — does not, in his view, meet the threshold for extradition.

“The German request is wholly disproportionate,” he says. “They are seeking up to 10 years of imprisonment over an alleged sum of €40,000. Mr Leviev is entitled to a fair trial, yet the overwhelming media bias makes such a trial impossible in Germany. The evidentiary basis is simply lacking — in our view, there is nothing that justifies extradition.”

The Georgian judges have within three months of the date of his detainment to decide whether the case presented by the German prosecutors satisfies the requirements for extradition under Georgian and international law.

Leviev’s legal team maintains that it does not, and that the matter should be resolved through Israeli jurisdiction instead. “We will pursue every legal avenue available to ensure the protection of his rights,” Nahari says.

For Leviev, the case represents both a legal challenge and a test of public perception. His lawyers insist that he is not the man the world came to know through the Netflix documentary, but rather someone seeking to live his life in legitimate ways. Whether the Georgian court — and later perhaps, the public — will accept that argument remains to be seen.

Georgia Tightens Travel Restrictions for Convicted Financial Offenders

BY MARIAM RAZMADZE Mzia Amaglobeli. Source: FB

Mzia Amaglobeli Named Finalist for 2025 Sakharov Prize

BY TEAM GT

M

zia Amaglobeli, founder of Batumelebi and Netgazeti, has been named a finalist for the 2025 Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought, the European Parliament announced.

The European Parliament’s Foreign Affairs and Development Committees voted Thursday morning to select three finalists for the prestigious award, which recognizes individuals and organizations defending human rights and freedom of expression.

The 2025 finalists are: • Mzia Amaglobeli and imprisoned journalists fighting for press freedom in Belarus;

• Journalists and humanitarian aid workers in Palestine and other conflict zones, represented by the Palestinian Journalists Syndicate, Red Crescent, and UNRWA; • Serbian students, recognized for their civic activism.

The Conference of Presidents, led by European Parliament President Roberta Metsola and political group leaders, will choose the laureate from this shortlist. The winner will be announced during the plenary session in Strasbourg on 22 October 2025. The award ceremony, which includes a €50,000 prize, will take place on 16 December 2025 in Strasbourg.

This nomination highlights Mzia Amaglobeli’s outstanding contributions to independent journalism and her ongoing efforts to defend press freedom in Georgia and beyond.

G

eorgian Parliament is advancing legislation that would prevent individuals convicted of financial crimes from leaving the country until they have fully compensated their victims or obtained their written consent.

The Committee on Legal Affairs has approved the amendments to the Criminal Procedure Code in its first reading.

An offender. Source: Chase Bank

The initiative, part of the government’s broader effort to strengthen accountability for financial misconduct, removes judicial discretion in imposing travel bans on offenders.

Tornike Cheishvili, First Deputy Chairman of the Legal Affairs Committee, stated that the restriction will apply when three conditions are met: • The offender is found guilty of crimes such as fraud, embezzlement, extortion, property damage, concealment of property, abuse of authority or negligence; • The convicted person is a Georgian

citizen or a stateless resident; • The victim has not provided written consent for the offender to leave the country.

Once a conviction is finalized, the National Bureau of Enforcement will notify the Ministry of Internal Affairs and the National Agency for Crime Prevention, Non-Custodial Sentences, and Probation which will enforce the ban through electronic monitoring systems.

Previously, travel restrictions could be applied at a judge’s discretion and were limited to a period of up to 16 years.

POLITICS

GEORGIA TODAY OCTOBER 17 - 23, 2025

5

Parliament Backs Bill Banning Specific Individuals from Political Activity and Elections

PM Kobakhidze. Source: Jam News

Kobakhidze: Lawsuit Declaring Up to 10 Political Parties Unconstitutional to be Filed Soon

BY MARIAM RAZMADZE

P

Georgian parliament. Source: gov.ge

BY TEAM GT

T

he Georgian Parliament has unanimously approved, with 80 votes, a legislative package in its first reading that will bar specific individuals from engaging in political party activities, holding public office, or participating in elections.

The bill, initiated by the ruling Georgian Dream party, was adopted under an expedited procedure following its review by the Parliament’s Legal Affairs Committee.

According to the proposed amendments, if the Constitutional Court rules to ban a political party, its members and associated individuals will lose their passive electoral rights — meaning they will be prohibited from being elected to Parliament or municipal bodies. In addition, they will be barred from holding leadership positions in constitutional

bodies, joining or funding other political parties, and acting as party donors.

Parties that include such individuals in their ranks will face criminal penalties, including fines.

Archil Gorduladze, Chairman of the Legal Affairs Committee, stated that once the amendments are enacted, the Georgian Dream parliamentary team will appeal to the Constitutional Court to initiate the banning of certain political parties and the restriction of related individual rights.

Gorduladze claimed: “this will put an end to the involvement of agents in politics.”

He also claimed that the legislative initiative fully complies with the Georgian Constitution and aligns with the practices of the European Court of Human Rights. Gorduladze noted that several European countries have banned political parties and restricted the political rights of their members.

“We see that from 2003 to the present day, certain parties—essentially one

party operating under different names, symbols, and colors—meet all the grounds for prohibition stipulated in the Constitution. Even setting everything else aside, the events of October 4 alone are sufficient to justify banning specific parties. The harmful actions committed by the ‘Collective National Movement’ against Georgia are evident both in the conclusions of investigative commissions and are well known to the public. Therefore, for the tenth time, Georgian society and the Georgian people are rejecting the return of the ‘National Agents’ to power,” Gorduladze said.

The Georgian Dream initiative includes amendments to the Organic Law on the Constitutional Court of Georgia, the Organic Law on Political Associations of Citizens, the Election Code, and the Criminal Code.

The final adoption of the legislative package, in its second and third readings, is expected within the current week.

rime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze said that the government will soon reveal the full list of political parties targeted in the upcoming constitutional lawsuit once the case is formally submitted to the Constitutional Court. The list, still being finalized, could include up to 10 parties, including several smaller ones.

The Prime Minister outlined two main criteria for including parties in the lawsuit. The first, he explained, concerns parties led by individuals who were part of what he described as the ‘bloody regime,’ referring to the previous gov-

ernment. “Those who represented the former regime and now lead political parties, such as the National Movement and Akhali, will be subjected to the corresponding lawsuit,” he stated.

The second criterion applies to political groups and individuals who, in the PM’s words, have participated in ‘sabotage against the state’ in cooperation with the former ruling party. “Anyone who worked together with that force for years to undermine the state will also be included,” he said.

Kobakhidze added that the final list will be made public in the coming days.

“There may be up to ten parties, including small ones. We’ll see when the lawsuit is officially filed,” he noted during an interview with the First Channel.

Zurabishvili: “Georgian Nightmare” Targets Diplomats and Silences Citizens

BY TEAM GT

S

anctions imposed on OSCE Chairperson-in-Office and Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen send a stark message to the international community — that “The Georgian Nightmare” is intimidating diplomats, suppressing free voices, and turning away from European values, Georgia’s fifth president, Salome Zurabishvili, wrote on X. Zurabishvili claimed that Europe must

not ignore these alarming developments.

“The fines against the OSCE Chair are a signal to the world: Georgian Nightmare intimidates diplomats, silences citizens, and abandons European principles. Citizens’ voices are suppressed, democratic norms ignored, and freedom is under attack. Europe must not look away!” Zurabishvili stated.

Georgia’s Ministry of Internal Affairs fined the OSCE Chairperson-in-Office, Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen, GEL 5,000 for allegedly “blocking the road” on Rustaveli Avenue.

Ukraine Latest: Winter Closes In as Ukraine’s War Becomes a Battle of Endurance, Drones, and Blackouts Continued from page 3 The blaze remained visible from kilometers away for days, marking the second confirmed strike on the facility within a week.

On the front, Russian forces made incremental gains. In the Kupiansk region, the village of Myrne fell to Moscow’s troops, and they pressed toward Ivanivka.

Ukrainian authorities responded by expanding evacuations across 40 settlements, relocating 409 families with 601 children. In Donetsk, Russia claimed to have captured Balahan, while counterattacks in Pokrovsk and Dobropillia saw intense combat with uncertain results.

Analysis suggests that Russian attacks overall have decreased this month— averaging just 11 daily assaults compared to 21—indicating a war of attrition rather than a sweeping offensive.

The toll on human life continued. Over the past day, Russian air and drone attacks killed at least 7 civilians and injured 29 across eleven Ukrainian regions. Kherson saw three deaths, including a child;

Donetsk lost two civilians to strikes; in Dnipropetrovsk, a 75-year-old woman was killed by an FPV drone; and in Sumy, six more were wounded. The Ukrainian air force intercepted 86 of 113 incoming drones and missiles, yet infrastructure and lives were still lost.

With desperation growing in the occupied territories, news broke that Yevhenii Matvieiev, the abducted mayor of Dniproudne in Zaporizhzhia Oblast, died in Russian custody in 2024 from severe blunt-force trauma. Matvieiev was seized in 2022 and long presumed missing. His repatriated remains now fuel ongoing investigations by Ukraine’s Security Service.

Meanwhile, the human and material cost on Russia is being continuously recalculated by Kyiv’s General Staff.

Since the invasion began, Russia has reportedly lost 1,126,220 troops, including 1,070 in a single day. Equipment losses include over 11,000 tanks, 33,000 artillery systems, 1,227 air defense systems, 70,021 drones, and 427 aircraft. Over 23,000 armored vehicles and 64,000 transport

and fuel vehicles are gone, alongside losses of helicopters, ships, and a submarine.

In Moscow, the war is exerting internal pressure. Public opinion polls suggest rising weariness: over 80 percent of Russians reportedly support ending hostilities imminently. The Kremlin is attempting to manage this discontent through tighter censorship, amplified propaganda, and elite purges. Analysts argue Russia’s modest offensives are stalling, with Ukrainian forces reclaiming territory in Sumy and mounting counterattacks across Donbas. The regime has few options besides doubling down on energy pressure runs, drone saturation, or empty saber-rattling with nuclear rhetoric.

Moscow remains obsessed with a “decisive breakthrough,” particularly in Donbas, hoping to capitalize on Ukraine exhaustion. But after repeated failures and staggering losses, many observers believe that the war is entering a protracted, pulverizing phase. If breakthroughs do not materialize by year’s

end, talk of a temporary ceasefire or a reconfigured pause may reemerge. Putin is unlikely to abandon his maximalist goals entirely, but may seek a tactical regrouping should Kyiv’s resistance persist.

On the diplomatic front, the US signal from Brussels was stark: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth warned Moscow of looming costs if hostilities continue.

President Trump hinted that Tomahawks could be deployed to Ukraine to enforce pressure. But for the moment, NATO is navigating a delicate balance: bolstering Ukraine without triggering direct confrontation.

In other news, Ukraine has intensified calls for global accountability as evidence mounts that Russia is systematically abducting, Russifying, and re educating kidnapped Ukrainian children. A Yale Humanitarian Research Lab report alleges more than 200 facilities across Russia and occupied Ukrainian territory are used to house deported children for political indoctrination and even military training.

Kyiv claims it has verified 19,546 children

forcibly transferred, though it argues the true figure is much higher. In response, Andriy Yermak, President Zelenskiy’s chief of staff, announced a recent success: “Twenty three Ukrainian children and adolescents have been brought out of Russian occupied areas” under Kyiv’s Bring Kids Back UA program.

Despite rare returns, many children remain out of reach, while Russia dismisses foreign reports as propaganda.

In September, Moscow rejected Yale’s findings, calling them “unscientific” and claiming the list of 339 children—submitted in peace talks—was inflated.

Ukrainian officials reject such denials.

Deputy Foreign Minister Mariana Betsa said: “Russia erases their identity … many of them do not even remember their parents.” Kyiv insists that the unconditional return of all abducted children must be a red line in any negotiations, labeling the abductions a distinct war crime under the Geneva Conventions and potentially a genocidal act under the Genocide Convention’s provisions on forcible transfer of children.

6

BUSINESS

GEORGIA TODAY

OCTOBER 17 - 23, 2025

From Family Farming to Commercial Partnerships with HoReCa

BY TEAM GT

T

o mark the International Day of Rural Women, 50 women dairy farmers from Samegrelo-Upper Svaneti were trained on the latest trends, demand, and opportunities in the Georgian HoReCa sector with renowned restaurateur Luka Nachkhebia at Zugdidi’s Technopark.

The two-day interactive series of educational activities and field visits was organized by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) with support from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC).

Mr. Nachkhebia’s masterclass combined lectures on HoReCa partnerships, quality standards, and branding with practical exercises where farmers pitched their products for expert feedback. It concluded with a product exhibition, photo showcase, and networking lunch, highlighting the farmers’ achievements and fostering new connections.

On the second day, women farmers received on-site coaching directly within their production facilities, focusing on hygiene, quality, and market readiness.

Field visits to FAO-supported farms in Tsalenjikha and Martvili offered tailored guidance and reinforced peer learning, further strengthening farmers’ technical and marketing skills. These activities

enhanced participants’ capacity to improve product quality, standardization, and market presentation, boosting their competitiveness in the HoReCa sector.

Along with celebrating the International Day of Rural Women, the two-day educational exchange was organized as part of an ongoing World Food Day campaign marking FAO’s 80th Anniversary.

“Women are the backbone of agriculture in Samegrelo. Together with SDC, we have trained hundreds of rural women in cheese production in the last years, trying to increase the quality, quantity and food safety standards of local produce,” said Javier Sanz Alvarez, FAO Programme Coordinator. “On the International Day of Rural Women, and as we mark FAO’s 80th Anniversary, we celebrate the progress we have achieved while reconfirming our commitment to empowering women in the agriculture sector. The achievements of women involved in this project truly highlight how many rural women only need to be given an opportunity to make a difference in their local production.”

“Through our impactful partnership with FAO, we are proud to support women farmers in Samegrelo-Upper Svaneti as they strengthen their skills, expand market opportunities, and build more resilient livelihoods,” said Barbara Boni, Regional Director of SDC. “Investing in rural women is investing in stronger communities and sustainable development, and we remain committed to

Women dairy farmers from Samegrelo-Upper Svaneti. Source: FAO

accompanying them on this journey.”

FAO in Samegrelo-Upper Svaneti, with the support of SDC, continues to empower women farmers through expanding Farmer Field Schools across the region,

providing practical knowledge, technical skills, and improved market access. By promoting financial inclusion, and peer learning, these efforts strengthen women’s livelihoods while building more

resilient and sustainable communities.

Through targeted investments, FAO and SDC reaffirm their commitment to advancing gender equality, rural development, and a food-secure future for all.

Georgian Truck Drivers Appeal for Government Help Amid Russian Visa Restrictions

BY MARIAM RAZMADZE

G

Members of Georgia's domestic workers' Union. Source: UN Women Georgia

Georgia’s Domestic Workers Form Union to Fight for Labor Rights

BY MARIAM RAZMADZE

G

eorgia’s first trade union representing domestic and care workers has been established by the Association of Nannies and Domestic Workers. The new organization currently unites around 100 members, including nannies, cleaners, tutors, personal assistants, nurses, cooks, elderly caregivers and aestheticians, with the shared goal of securing recognition and protection for their labor rights.

Despite the essential role domestic workers play in Georgian households, local legislation does not yet recognize domestic labor as a formal employment category. As a result, thousands of workers, the vast majority of them women, remain outside the protection of the Labor Code, without access to benefits

or safety guaranteed to other professions.

In Georgia, women account for roughly 99% of all domestic workers, many of whom face unstable employment conditions and lack of social protection. The newly formed union aims to change this by organizing workers, raising public awareness and advocating for the inclusion of domestic labor in national legislation.

UN Women has been actively supporting the efforts to strengthen domestic workers’ rights in Georgia through its ongoing project ‘Women’s Economic Empowerment in the South Caucasus.’

The initiative, implemented with the financial support of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) and the Austrian Development Agency (ADA), works closely with the Association of Nannies and Domestic Workers to improve labor standards and fair treatment for women in the care economy.

eorgian truck drivers are urging the government to intervene after Russia imposed new entry restrictions that have left many facing fines, deportation and loss of income. The drivers gathered outside the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on October 13, calling for diplomatic action to help the crisis.

The dispute started with Moscow’s decision to shorten the visa-free stay for Georgian citizens from 180 days to 90 days, a change that drivers say makes it nearly impossible to complete crossborder transport operations. Long delays at the Zemo Larsi checkpoint, often lasting up to two weeks, combined with extended customs and cargo procedures inside Russia, have pushed many drivers over the new limit.

Some drivers have already been deported or fined, while others have had to suspend their work altogether. They warn that the restrictions could have broader economic repercussions for Georgia, disrupting exports of necessary

Truck drivers outside the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Source: bmg

goods such as wine, fruit and wheat, and giving Russian carriers an opportunity to dominate routes traditionally managed by Georgian firms.

The truckers are urging the government to open negotiations with Moscow, using the examples of Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan as countries that resolved similar.

The Transport Corridor Research Center (TCRC) has joined the discussions and described its initial talks with

the Foreign Ministry as “constructive,” though no final solution has been announced.

The drivers are asking the government to push for an exemption or special arrangement that would allow them to continue their work without facing penalties.

For now, discussions between the TCRC and the Foreign Ministry are ongoing, but drivers say time is running out as fines and deportations continue to mount.

Kakheti Wineries Process 283,000 tons of Grapes as 2025 Harvest Peaks

BY MARIAM RAZMADZE

D

ata from the Ministry of Agriculture reveals that Georgia’s annual grape harvest has started, with wine enterprises in Kakheti having processed around 283,000 tons of grapes as of October 13.

The breakdown shows Rkatsiteli leading the list with 145,000 tons, followed

by Saperavi with 120,000 tons, while the remainder consists of other technical

varieties. In just the past 24 hours, Kakheti alone processed about 8,000 tons of grapes, showing the high pace of this year’s harvest season.

The grape collection is also progressing in Racha where 1.8 thousand tons of Alexandrouli and Mujuretuli have been processed in the Ambrolauri municipality. The total expected harvest in Racha is estimated at around 2,000 tons.

So far, approximately 20,000 winegrowers have delivered their grapes across Kakheti and Racha, with 521 wineries participating in the harvest. The ministry projects Kakheti’s total harvest to

reach 200,000–250,000 tons this year.

Under a new policy decision, the stateowned Harvest Management Company will purchase surplus grapes at differentiated prices based on quality: • 50 GEL per kg for Saperavi grapes, • 20 GEL for other wine varieties allowed under Georgia’s “Law on Vine and Wine”, • 00 GEL for substandard or damaged grapes.

Unlike in previous years, private wine companies in Kakheti will not receive state subsidies, a shift in how the government supports the wine sector during the harvest.

8

SOCIETY

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NEXT Coral is designed as more than a residence. It’s a symbol of refined living and intelligent design, where waterfront beauty meets advanced engineering and long-term value.

What distinguishes NEXT Coral is its rare combination of prime seaside location, architectural individuality, and sustainable construction standards. Set along Dubai’s evolving coast-

line, the project embodies both lifestyle appeal and urban sophistication, enhancing the city’s modern skyline while maintaining a strong connection to nature.

Architecturally, NEXT Coral stands out with its wave-inspired facade, curved balconies, and glass-lined terraces that reflect the rhythm of the sea. Each level is surrounded by soft lines and greenery, creating a sense of motion and lightness. This organic composition captures the essence of coastal Dubai: elegant, fluid, and timeless.

With its distinctive architectural identity, environmental efficiency, and harmonious relationship with the surroundings, NEXT Coral represents a forward-looking vision for urban living on Dubai Islands - a project where innovation meets serenity, and design becomes a statement of the future.

GEORGIA TODAY

OCTOBER 17 - 23, 2025

SOCIETY

GEORGIA TODAY OCTOBER 17 - 23, 2025

9

Sakartvelo’s Alpha-Generation Coming of Age

BY NUGZAR B. RUHADZE

T

he art of handling maturity is not a very simple thing to master. Georgia’s Alpha Generation is coming of age, rushing through modern thick and thin as we all did in our own time of personal maturation, getting ready to enter the universally cherished prime of life—the time of anticipated strength, abundance, and free decisionmaking. Gen Alpha are the kids between the ages of one and fifteen, who grew up in an utterly digitalized world and whose character was molded by scientifictechnological advance, turning them into savvy, diverse, and malleable types of human beings.

These are the guys who will be handling the fates of the motherland, figuring in the Republic’s legislative, executive, and judicial bodies—provided such governing structures are still around when they come of relevant age. Their ceaseless access to the internet, smartphones, tablets, and myriad other types

of digital devices has shaped them into the personalities they happen to be now and will be in the nearest future, unless the selfsame technology brings about novelties to radically alter their lives.

And not just that!

Gen Alpha species, first and utmost, are the Artificial-Intelligence-Natives— a fact that might fully and finally eradicate in them the remaining vestige of a sense of nationality, because they are probably destined to live in a world of unseen-before racial and ethnic indifference and diversity. In their time of maturity, work habits, career choices, social interactions, general education, consumer behavior, and cultural demeanor will all be influenced by a powerful stress on the overwhelming personalization of everything—including learning strategies, digital sources, and a clearly-cut proclivity for ethical revolution.

I personally have to do with tens, if not more, of Gen Alpha kids. I teach them, that’s why! And not only do I teach them—I am trying to keep a keen eye on their behavior and manner of conduct. I have to admit that these children

are extremely interesting, and I always manage to find a common tongue between us. Most of them in this country are sharp in perception and benign in social interaction. They are certainly influenced by screens and the online communities thereof, but that influence is mostly innocuous and sometimes even beneficial.

Their tech-savviness is helping them achieve personal maturity at an early age, thus maintaining a strong potential to smartly take care of their motherland when their time to rule arrives. Georgia needs a talented, qualified, and readyto-act workforce to make actual progress, and the workforce development strategies have to be focused on the potential of Generation Alpha in skilled trades— keeping in mind that these young men and women are absolutely ready to handle the tech-based nature of their incipient jobs.

Hopefully, the businesses in Georgia are beginning to study the preferences of Gen Alpha, as they are expected to shape the prospective business, consumption, technological, scientific, cultural, and diplomatic trends. The social

and academic inclusion of our ‘iPad Kids’ matters very much. There are many tricky ways of correctly and usefully engaging Generation Alpha: let’s concentrate on their digital nativity, incorporate video-based content, delegate tasks—thus nurturing a sense of control in them—encourage face-to-face interaction, help them shrewdly navigate the online environment, control screen time, and delineate technology use.

There are certain pros and cons determining the quality of life and action of Gen Alpha: having grown up with technology, they are hyperconnected and overly exposed to internet virtuality; they are self-driven and enjoy independent problem-solving; emotionally intelligent and adaptable, their entrepreneurial and collaborative spirit is amazing. These are the pros.

The cons are also to be taken into account: excessive screen time, shortness of attention, social alienation, lack of face-to-face social skills, anxiety, depression, overdependence on technology, limited outdoor play, reduced emphasis on reading. Gosh, how far is all this

from our Georgian national character!

Now the question is how to happily maintain both the ‘Lexus’ and the ‘Olive Tree’ in Sakartvelo. To somehow handle all the above cons, it will take us—the grownups—to assist the Alphas in handling their coming-up maturity, and this might be a piece of real art, not just another parental triviality.

We can at least cultivate in those verydifferent-from-us kids some self-awareness, emotional regulation, accountability for their actions, handling situations thoughtfully rather than emotionally, fostering intellectual maturity via critical thinking and open-mindedness, nurturing in them behavioral maturity, taki n g r e s p o n s i b i l i t y, p r a c t i c i n g self-discipline, adapting to change, communicating clearly, resolving conflict constructively, and, most importantly, understanding other people’s opinions by using a sense of compassion and responsiveness.

Too much? Possible! But inevitable to cope with—keeping in mind that the Alpha Generation is the one in whose hands Sakartvelo will find itself in less than just one score of years.

Löwenbräu Hosts Authentic German Festival in Georgia

BY TEAM GT

O

n September 20-21, Oktoberfest was held in Dedaena Park. The spirit of the German festival in Georgia was traditionally brought by Löwenbräu. For two days, beer lovers were welcomed with an authentic German atmosphere, music, a variety of dishes, and, most importantly, Löwenbräu.

The festival kicked off on September 20 with a grand opening ceremony. Company executives and representatives of the Embassy of Germany tapped the ceremonial wooden keg in a festive atmosphere. Throughout the day, DJs Nino Kvantrishvili, Ninshu, and Hatsvali performed for the guests. The main highlight

At the German Festival. Source: Löwenbräu

of the day was the competition among the finalists of Löwenbräu’s Facebook contest, followed by the awarding of the

winner, who received a ticket to attend Oktoberfest in Munich. The evening continued with a performance by Killages.

Day 2 of the festival was once again filled with music, as Tobako Tween, Kote Jafaridze, Sandro Jorbenadze, and Levi Love Disco performed outstanding DJ sets, while Elene Kalandadze gave a live performance.

‘Oktoberfest is the world’s largest public festival, bringing together thousands of people. Years ago, we decided to organize Oktoberfest annually in Georgia. Our goal is to develop beer culture and strengthen the beer industry, and that is precisely the aim of this festival as well. Of course, Oktoberfest is also a celebration of meeting friends, sharing emotions, joy. Oktoberfest is unimaginable without Löwenbräu, and in Georgia, Löwenbräu is the proud host of the event. Löwenbräu plays a key role in integrating this unique tradition into the local culture, and we are proud to host an event that continues to grow in scale

every year. This year, for the second time, the festival was open to the public and exceeded all expectations. Dedaena Park was filled with both local guests and international visitors,’ said Nikoloz Khundzakishvili, Corporate Affairs Director of EFES Georgia.

Oktoberfest is a 200-year-old German tradition that has grown into a global celebration of beer, food, and culture.

Each year, beer lovers from all corners of the world gather to enjoy an unforgettable Munich experience. Oktoberfest is one of the largest and most popular public festivals in the world. In fact, it is considered the biggest fair globally, attracting over 6 million visitors annually. Löwenbräu is one of only six breweries granted the right to participate in the Oktoberfest. Notably, Löwenbräu has been sold at every Oktoberfest since 1810.

start a new Facebook page, called Real Life Far Side, for example. Here, members will be able to upload their own examples of actual, photographic (NOT AI, ever!) far side cartoons, either existing or (as this inaugural one is) entirely new, but in the spirit of the series. Found scenes like this one, or staged. And now that I have described this here, I have no alternative but either to 1) erase this paragraph from my article or 2) follow through with the page before anyone ELSE can beat me to it. I realize that being page moderator would include some time to allow only proper images through, and reject the rest, the spam, off-topics, the AI pretenders, and so on.

There is a choice called 3), though: let someone else take on (or not) the crea-

tion and moderation of the above Facebook page. It’s not obligatory that I do it, or even that it come into existence at all…

In any case, welcome to the occasional invasion of The Far Side into our universe, puny humans. It’s not dull or joyless to be me, I can assure you of that.

Far Side Coffee BLOG BY TONY HANMER

I

was introduced to Gary Larson’s series of cartoons called The Far Side at about age 18, in my first full-time job, in mid-1985, working at a small screen printing company in a garage. One of my two bosses was a big fan of the one-panel comics, had books collecting them, and I was drawn in and hooked. Right up my alley, the weird, often science-based jokes were frequently populated by dumpy labcoated professors and women in hornrim glasses. I’ve been a fan ever since we met.

It would be the most outlandish thing in the world if such a universe could ever intersect with another unusual one of mine, that of Photos of Ground Coffee Leftovers in Mugs, a series several years old and growing sometimes by the day. But the impossible, or extremely unlikely, has happened, so I must document and describe it for you, Dear Reader.

Pareidolia, which lets one see concrete images in random places like clouds and wood knots, is another powerful force in my life, and it is this which has led me down all sorts of rabbit holes of delight.

Svaneti’s OTHER life forms, made of rock, shadows, clouds, snow and ice, have revealed themselves to me and demanded that their stories be told (serialized in this very newspaper!). And, yes, things jump out at me from the bottom of my thrice-daily coffee mug, on a regular basis, and I photograph them. So perhaps the overwhelmingly unlikely was just a matter of time. That time has

come, at least once.

For a while I was using one of our guest house’s chipped-edge (thus reject), slightly tulip-shaped white guest mugs as my java vessel of choice. It also became the substrate through which one of the Bespectacled Women of Mr Larson chose to reveal herself to me, and me alone (but allowing herself to be photographed like all the other leftovers, and thus to become available for anyone else to see too).

I could hardly believe my eyes. Not only was she undeniably There for the Blessed to See, but she found herself, true Far Side fashion, in the maw of some kind of Lovecraftian slug-monster! This prompted the only fitting caption of her thoughts, which I promptly added to the scene. It was PERFECT. So much so that I’m debating spray-varnishing this iconic scene to preserve it forever, and thus add it to my small collection of 3D pareidolia objects as opposed to mere photographs of the same. Before I do this, though, I’m photographing it in different ways.

Even using my iPhone 12, I have been able to get a surprisingly good, large image. This I did by shooting in RAW file format (much more tonal information than a mere jpeg), and taking four hand-held shots from exactly the same position. These I then open in Photoshop; enlarge to four times their original size; combine into a Smart Object; set its render method to Median to allow any pixel noise between the four shots to cancel itself out. Bit of a technical process, but one I use occasionally, for what are likely to be my best images, to make them huge. Then I crop, finalize

Photo and caption by the author

the tones, and in this case am left with a 35-megapixel image. I do a solarized color version of this next (that means: invert half of the tones…), then make the original black and white and solarize THAT, for a total of three different versions. The full treatment for Herself.

I might also try to get the whole thing in sharp focus, as opposed to the above versions, which have only the bottom of the mug sharp. This would involve, tripod-mounted, a large series of otherwise identical shots, but slightly changing the focus manually for each one. These can then be combined in Photoshop in yet another one of computational photography’s sub-genres, Focus Stacking. So many possibilities.

Now all that’s left to do, perhaps, is

Tony Hanmer has lived in Georgia since 1999, in Svaneti since 2007, and been a weekly writer and photographer for GT since early 2011. He runs the “Svaneti Renaissance” Facebook group, now with over 2000 members, at www.facebook.com/groups/ SvanetiRenaissance/ He and his wife also run their own guest house in Etseri: www.facebook.com/hanmer.house.svaneti

10

CULTURE

GEORGIA TODAY

OCTOBER 17 - 23, 2025

The Afterlives of Sound: Sulkhan Tsintsadze at 100

Photo by the author

REVIEW BY IVAN NECHAEV

I

n Tbilisi this October, two evenings were devoted to Sulkhan Tsintsadze — a composer whose legacy remains inseparable from Georgia’s twentieth century itself.

The centenary celebrations, held on October 10 and 11, unfolded as encounters with a sound-world that once carried the aspirations, contradictions, and self-images of an entire culture. The first, presented by the Georgian State String Quartet and pianist Tamar Licheli at the Georgian Philharmonic Auditorium, concentrated on Tsintsadze’s chamber language; the second, led by Vakhtang Kakhidze with the Tbilisi Symphony Orchestra and the Georgian State Choir, illuminated his symphonic and cinematic imagination. Together, they offered a renewed confrontation with the musical DNA of Georgia’s modernity.

Tsintsadze’s centenary matters because his music remains one of the few cohesive attempts to articulate a national idiom without reducing it to folklore.

Born in 1925, educated in Tbilisi and Moscow, he belonged to the generation that sought to reconcile Georgian into-

nation and Soviet modernism — an impossible synthesis that, paradoxically, produced some of the most lasting musical architectures of the period. His six string quartets, written between 1950 and 1976, mark a continuous dialogue between tradition and structure, ornament and line. The Sixth Quartet, performed at the first concert, is emblematic: it moves between modal lyricism and rhythmic volatility, between folk contour and chromatic saturation, but its form is always taut, architectural, unafraid of silence.

Hearing the Sulkhan Tsintsadze Georgian State String Quartet perform this music — Giorgi Khaindrava and Nika Barateli on violins, Nodar Jvania on viola, Giorgi Jorjadze on cello — was like watching a collective memory being reactivated through touch. The group, long synonymous with Tsintsadze’s name, has cultivated not just fidelity but a kind of physical empathy with his idiom. Their tone, matte and slightly raw, evokes the Caucasian polyphonic vocality that underlies much of Tsintsadze’s thinking.

The Miniatures for String Quartet, performed next, appeared almost as distilled commentaries on that larger language — small essays in timbre and rhythm, each a vignette of Georgian life

refracted through Western form. Each miniature holds a micro-drama: a folk melody transformed by chromatic fog, a dance halted mid-turn, a fragment of speech turned into motif. The quartet performed them without sentiment, allowing the modernist edge — the intervals sharpened, the texture stripped to essentials — to speak clearly.

When pianist Tamar Licheli joined for César Franck’s Piano Quintet, the evening shifted from introspection to symphonic breadth. The Franck, of course, is a different world: its chromaticism is confessional, its emotional register European rather than Caucasian. Yet the juxtaposition was deliberate. It revealed how Tsintsadze’s music, for all its rootedness, belongs to the same emotional architecture — late-Romantic tension reimagined through a peripheral consciousness. Licheli’s phrasing was architectural, her dynamic control sculptural.

The Georgian String Quartet responded with dark resonance, as if Franck’s harmonic storms were passing through another climate.

The following evening at the Djansug Kakhidze Center presented Tsintsadze’s orchestral persona — extroverted and cinematic. Vakhtang Kakhidze, conducting the Tbilisi Symphony Orchestra and Georgian State Choir, offered two large suites: from the ballet Rivares and from Tsintsadze’s film music, including the beloved Maya from Tskneti and Soldier’s Father.

The suite from Rivares revealed Tsintsadze’s orchestral clarity — his ability to create texture through density rather than volume. The strings shimmered in close voicings, while the winds articulated folk-like calls without imitating them. The rhythmic precision of the orchestra gave the music a sculptural presence: the dance episodes, built on irregular meters, felt less festive than ritualistic. Kakhidze’s conducting emphasized architecture over sentiment; he shaped climaxes like slow geological eruptions rather than bursts of color.

Tsintsadze’s film suites, presented in the second half, illuminated another facet of his voice — his ability to transform narrative music into moral commentary. The scores for Dragonfly,

Photo by the author

Bashi-Achuk, and Otar’s Widow remain among the most recognizable in Georgian cinema, yet when heard together, they form a kind of collective memory of the Soviet 1960s. In Otar’s Widow, the muted brass and restrained choral writing evoke both intimacy and desolation — the sound of a society that sings inwardly. Bashi-Achuk, with its rhythmic ostinati and modal drive, channels the mythic energy of folk epic into orchestral discipline. And Maya from Tskneti, the most famous, balances irony and warmth: its melody, almost naive in contour, becomes in orchestral form a study in repetition as nostalgia.

The Georgian State Choir, prepared by Archil Ushveridze, contributed an essential dimension — the human timbre that Tsintsadze always sought in his instrumental textures. Their blend was earthy, not ethereal, grounding the orchestral brilliance in a collective vocal body.

To hear these two concerts in succession was to move through the cultural psychology of Georgia itself. Tsintsadze’s language emerged during a time when modernism had to disguise itself in national costume, when experimentation survived under the rhetoric of tradition.

His music encodes that paradox — it is both modernist and populist, both struc-

tural and melodic. Yet what makes it endure is not ideological cleverness but a profound understanding of musical form as historical consciousness.

In the chamber works, that consciousness manifests as counterpoint: voices negotiating space, asserting individuality within constraint. In the orchestral works, it takes the form of montage — fragments of melody and rhythm juxtaposed like film scenes, producing emotional meaning through sequence rather than development. Tsintsadze’s training as a cellist is audible in both dimensions: he thinks in layers, in physical gestures, in the tactile friction of sound against silence.

To speak of Tsintsadze today is to confront the question of how music remembers. Post-Soviet Georgia has inherited not only his scores but the ideological frameworks that once contained them.

In the current moment, when nationalism and cosmopolitanism again define cultural discourse, Tsintsadze’s example offers a subtler model: a nationalism of structure rather than slogan, a cosmopolitanism of form rather than style. His quartets and suites show how the local can achieve universality not through exoticism but through compositional logic.

Empire in Soft Focus: Madama Butterfly in Tbilisi REVIEW BY IVAN NECHAEV

L

ast weekend in Tbilisi, the State Opera and Ballet Theater reopened its stage to a production that has haunted the global repertoire for more than a century: Giacomo Puccini’s Madama Butterfly. Directed by Keita Asari and conducted by Filippo Conti, this revival — a co-production with Teatro alla Scala — arrived in Georgia like an echo of two empires at once: the European imagination that created the opera and the local post-Soviet world still negotiating its own image within it.

Performed on October 10–12, the production embodied both the seductive familiarity and the critical discomfort of Puccini’s tragedy. The score, written in 1904, at the height of Italy’s colonial anxiety, remains a study in listening across power lines. That the opera reemerges in Tbilisi, a city long situated between empires, gives the work a resonance that exceeds nostalgia. Here, Butterfly becomes less a story of Japan and America than a meditation on spectatorship itself — on the gaze that constructs “the Other” through beauty.

Asari’s staging, designed originally for La Scala and revived with precision by the Georgian company, presents a visual economy that mirrors Puccini’s musical transparency. The set, minimalist yet luminous, floats between realism and abstraction: paper walls, open frames, and light so soft it seems to breathe.

Lighting designer Stefano Gorreri and costume designer Hanae Mori constructed a world of filtered textures —

silk and shoji screens, bodies half-visible in shadow. The aesthetic is not orientalist excess but restraint; it renders the familiar story uncanny, as if viewed through memory rather than history.

From the opening measures of the overture, Filippo Conti shaped the orchestra into a surface of transparency. The Tbilisi Opera Orchestra responded with a sound that shimmered rather than sang — strings articulated like light, winds voiced in small gestures, percussion almost tactile. Puccini’s harmonic world, so often caricatured as cinematic, here emerged as architectural. Conti’s pacing was slow, deliberate; each harmonic suspension felt like a held breath.

The entrance of Cio-Cio-San, sung by Anna Imedashvili, revealed not a naïve child but a figure of startling interiority.

Her voice, cool and silvery, lacked the traditional Puccinian warmth — and that absence became its power. She approached the role not as a victim or icon, but as a consciousness negotiating her own theatricality. In “Ancora un passo or via,” her phrasing felt self-aware, almost hesitant, as if she recognized the fragile fiction she was inhabiting. The orchestra under Conti reinforced this duality — strings in muted tremolo, harp arpeggios dissolving like paper.

In Madama Butterfly, music functions as ideology. Puccini’s Japanese motifs — pentatonic figures, parallel fourths, delicate instrumental colors — operate less as ethnographic signs than as sonic masks. Beneath them lies the harmonic language of European desire. Conti’s interpretation brought that awareness into focus. The “Star-Spangled Banner” motive that accompanies Pinkerton, played by Armaz Darashvili with lyrical

Photo by the author

bravado, sounded less heroic than absurdly foreign, a brass intrusion into a fragile world. Darashvili’s tenor, bright and assertive, avoided caricature — his Pinkerton was not a villain but a symptom. Against him, Imedashvili’s Cio-CioSan maintained an interior distance: her voice refused submission even in lyric surrender.

In the love duet that concludes Act I, the contrast between European romantic harmony and stylized pentatonic melody becomes a theater of empire.

Conti balanced it with precision: the orchestra’s warmth undercut by sudden pauses, as if questioning the sincerity of its own lyricism. The final chord, suspended between E major and its shadow, lingered in the air like a moral residue.

Act II — the long scene of waiting — remains one of the most psychologically precise constructions in opera. Under Asari’s direction, the stage turned into a space of durational time. The walls shifted imperceptibly, light thinned, and silence acquired weight. Irina Sher-

azadishvili’s Suzuki offered a grounded counterpoint to Imedashvili’s tension: her mezzo-soprano dark, supple, maternal. The chorus, prepared by Avtandil Chkhenkeli, provided offstage color — distant and hollow, as if coming from another world.

Here, the Tbilisi orchestra reached its expressive peak. The strings breathed collectively; winds hovered in translucent textures. Conti’s tempi stretched the scene to its limit, letting the tension of waiting become the drama itself. The “Humming Chorus” — often treated as a sentimental interlude — here felt like the sound of suspension. The chorus’s vowels, pure and vibratoless, created an almost minimalist texture that evoked the ambient art of later decades more than Romantic opera. The effect was hypnotic: time ceased, leaving only resonance.

To revisit Madama Butterfly in 2025 is to confront a moral question: can we still perform this opera without reproducing its imperial gaze? Asari’s production does not answer; it listens. The staging frames Cio-Cio-San’s death not as spectacle but as withdrawal — an erasure of image. Puccini’s tragedy survives precisely because it exposes the machinery of desire. Its aestheticization of suffering, its transformation of colonial encounter into melody, continues to unsettle because it mirrors the structures that sustain art itself.

Madama Butterfly in Tbilisi forces one to reconsider what it means to inherit the global canon. For Georgia — a country central to the history of cultural mediation — to stage Puccini today is to test how a local voice can reframe an imperial narrative.

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Aesthetic Practice in Times of Global Turmoil purchased the first edition of a video documenting his sexual encounter with the artist, staged in a gallery. The work does not sensationalize the act itself but contextualizes it through press releases, installation views, and historical references, exposing the centuries-old analogy between the sale of art and prostitution. Fraser insists that the collector paid for the artwork, not for the sex—an important distinction that lays bare the complex entanglement of desire, money, and power.

Across these works, Fraser poses a fundamental question: who defines what counts as art—and for whom? By exposing how cultural value is constructed and controlled, she reveals art’s double role as both a powerful instrument of exclusion and a potential shared space of common culture. Her practice compels institutions, collectors, and audiences alike to confront their own complicity in sustaining these structures, turning the mirror of critique directly toward the cultural sphere itself.

Last but not least, for the first time in decades, a Georgian artist, David Apakidze, has been featured by the Berlin Art Week 2025 as this year's Kunstverein Ost grant holder and recipient of the 2025 Claus Michaletz Prize. In his exhibition The Knight at the Crossroads, a

BY DR. LILY FÜRSTENOWKHOSITASHVILI

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erlin art season this year took place amidst massive protests by local artists and art institutions against substantial reductions in state funding for the arts. In spite of all odds, the extraordinary profusion of exhibitions, performances, and art events during Berlin Art Week earlier in September was overwhelming and diverse. Within the current climate, characterized by multiple crises, the author of this article selected to review exhibitions that attempted to be subversive in their character and choice of artists, critically engaged with the challenges of today, and managed to bring to public attention voices of those who are mostly overheard.

Take, for example, Savvy Contemporary, which exhibited a carefully selected group of artists who analyzed the hardships of migrants living abroad, separated from their homes. Close to Home: Remittance Spaces Between Arrival and Return questioned, through the artistic positions, not only the notions of native land related to family bonds changing through various generations but also the complexities of global socio-economic relationships that underlie patterns of migration based on transfers of money, goods, and more. Isn't "home" the place where one feels at home and welcome? And if one is an outcast in foreign lands, why does one still choose to leave home and live abroad? For many, it's not even a question of choice, but a way of survival: e.g. working abroad in the "West" doing jobs that no one would like to do in order to send money home, thus saving relatives from starvation; escaping from dictatorial political regimes; saving money to build private houses back home; or just moving abroad to secure better futures for children. Here are a couple of artistic positions one can't help mentioning: The taste of homeland is probably something that no one can resist, irrespective of the time one spends abroad.

By setting a mirrored table with doubleended spoons filled with delicious foods from her home country, Akshita Garud from India, in collaboration with fellow artist Avantika Khanna, created the atmosphere of joy commonly related to a festively decorated table, as opposed by the bitterness of the context of the whole setting. With every spoonful the visitors took, they were supposed to think of the complicated psychology of give and take associated with it all.

Because for every piece of food you offer, you expect to receive something in return and vice versa. Probably and most likely not a food offering but money that one is expected to send home to support family and friends—remittance. Lowpaid jobs that migrants have to take up abroad are mostly exhausting and degrading, working hours extremely long and living conditions inadequate. Yet the bitterness of it all could hardly poison the joy of a tasty, lavish meal provided for by remittance money.

It's not only about the money one sends as remittance but the intricate ways migrants are induced to search for to get this money to the respective destinations. Yairan Montejo, also known as Cinco, in his mural presented as a comic strip, showed all the absurd obstacles that stand in the way, making the act itself of sending money home an almost heroic endeavor. In a witty way, with his

Untitled. Stained glass. 2025. KVOST

characteristic humorous protagonists, the artist managed to convey a critical tableau of entangled human dependencies caused by the absurdities of bureaucratic blockades characterizing contemporary money transfer systems, as well as the unfair distribution of wealth in general.

Tra My Nguyen, on the other hand, chose to focus in her installation Hung the Moon Behind the Curtain on fabrics with patterns characteristic of massproduced Vietnamese garments. The remarkable patterns on pieces of fabric let the eye wander, enjoying their beauty, yet creating a symbolic counterpoint to the exploitative character of global fashion industries as well as raising awareness about the social injustices in globalized societies. The fabrics, mounted on tall narrow aluminum structures, echoed the proportions of Vietnam's "tube houses"—multi-story dwellings often built with remittance incomes.

Appearing like romantic curtains on windows or thresholds dividing the inside from the outside, the fabrics emerged as architectural elements and expressions of emotional labor.

Speaking of architecture—perhaps the most spectacular contribution to the exhibition was by Van Bo Le-Mentzel, an architect born in Thailand and living in Berlin. His Artist Wallidency, a true masterpiece of austerity, efficient space management, and Buddhist self-discipline, was a two-story wooden dwelling in a movable wall occupying all in all 355 cm x 80 cm plus 300 cm in height. Originally a container for furniture, this movable wall was redesigned by the architect into a place of work and seclusion with basic amenities like a mini electric stove, toilet, table to work on, and a bed upstairs.

A subversive critique on the decadence of the luxurious, vast apartments and homes filled with a profusion of extravagant furniture trending among the rich upper classes of Western societies. Van Bo Le-Mentzel's inspiration came from

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young queer artist from Georgia weaves a subtle yet powerful political narrative, confronting the persecution and repression that queer communities continue to face in his homeland—often with exile as the only escape. At the heart of his work lies the crossroads: a metaphorical state of uncertainty, of standing before multiple paths when facing systemic injustice.

Through poetic stained-glass pieces, rendered in delicate colors and infused with visual references to instantly recognizable Georgian cultural imagery— knighthood, phallic daggers, and blood stains—the artist delivers a tongue-incheek yet sharply critical message. He exposes the violent and exclusionary undercurrents embedded in conventional interpretations of national symbols, revealing how these once-celebrated icons are blood-stained relics of power.

By recontextualizing these cultural motifs through a queer lens, the artist opens a space for their reinterpretation, questioning what national identity can mean today. His work does not seek to erase tradition but to transform it, showing how shifting perspectives can make cultural heritage relevant to contemporary societies—more open, inclusive, and capable of embracing difference.

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the life of Co Hanh Ngo, a Buddhist nun who used to live in a tiny room in a pagoda in Hanover. As an architect, he was fascinated by how she created a life for herself within just 5 square meters.

Throughout her life, she remained active in a Buddhist community, sold souvenirs at fairs and in the pagoda gift shop. With the money she saved and sent to her daughter in Laos, she provided prosperity for her family back home: a two-story villa where her daughter set up a prayer room to remember her mother—ironically, very much like a conventional "home sweet home."

A genuine highlight among the current Berlin exhibitions is undoubtedly Andrea Fraser's work show at Nagel Draxler Gallery. Andrea Fraser has spent her artistic career interrogating the intricate power structures and emotional economies of the art world, and few works exemplify this as incisively as her iconic performance series May I Help You? (1991), the six recordings of which are now on view at the Nagel Draxler Kabinett, and her controversial project Untitled (2003).

In May I Help You? Fraser (and subsequently in further versions, invited performers) assumes multiple roles, each exposing a different perspective within the gallery ecosystem. The artist moves fluently between the voice of a highly skilled gallerist seducing collectors with persuasive rhetoric, an outsider excluded from elite cultural circles, and a passionate art lover whose devotion transcends market logic. Through these shifts, Fraser uncovers the language games and coded behaviors that sustain art’s economic and symbolic value. The work does not simply satirize the system; it reveals how deeply identity, desire, and power are woven into the seemingly neutral act of “selling” or “appreciating” art.

In Untitled (2003), Fraser extends this critical inquiry to its most intimate and unsettling terrain. The project documents a real transaction: a collector

Two Bodies One Head. Stained glass. 2025. Exhibition view. KVOST

Journalists: Ana Dumbadze Vazha Tavberidze Tony Hanmer Nugzar B. Ruhadze Ivan Nechaev Mariam Razmadze

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