Parliamentary Chairperson Meets OSCE Envoy

Georgian Parliamentary Chairperson Nino Burjanadze held talks with Special Envoy of the OSCE Chairman-in-Office, Senator Pierre Chevalier on February 16, who arrived in Georgia to assess the current situation in the country.

The Special Envoy of the OSCE Chairman-in –Office said at a joint briefing after the talks that he had already got acquainted with the Parliament’s resolution on peacekeepers, which was adopted on February 15.

He reiterated OSCE’s support to Georgia’s territorial integrity and hailed the position of the Georgian authorities to peacefully settle the conflicts.

“I call on each side to use diplomatic methods. I hope that new and constructive decisions will be found during the session of the Joint Control Commission in a week [in Vienna on February 20-21] taking into account the Georgian Parliament’s resolution,” Pierre Chevalier said.

The Georgian Parliamentary Chairperson said that the implementation of a peace plan has come to a standstill because of Russia’s position.

“The Georgian Parliament’s latest resolution says that the Russian peacekeepers should leave the conflict zone and be replaced by neutral and impartial peacekeeping forces… There is no alternative that the current peacekeeping operation should be replaced,” Nino Burjanadze said at the joint briefing.

She stressed the necessity of OSCE’s support to this process in order to avoid turning off the current path of peaceful resolution of the conflict.