U.S. officials say they are still seeking to put Georgia and Moldova on the agenda of a G8 pre-summit foreign ministers’ meeting on June 29 in Moscow, but they don’t expect to succeed, the Washington Post reported on June 19.
“We’re dead in the water,” says Bruce Jackson, head of the Project on Transitional Democracies, who has close links with many in the U.S. administration, told the Washington Post.
“Russia is playing a more aggressive, thought-out game, and they are outplaying us,” he added.
Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili said in an interview with Imedi TV aired on June 18 that ?Georgia?s issue will definitely? be discussed at the summit of G8 leaders on July 15-17 in St. Petersburg.
But as the Washington Post?s op-ed columnist Jackson Diehl writes: ?Georgians and Moldovans will watch Western leaders toast Putin while the Russian boycotts of their exports and promotion of separatism in their countries go undiscussed.?
The Washington Post also reported that at a meeting of NATO Defense Ministers in Brussels on June 8, ?France and several other European governments rejected U.S. talk of an “enhanced dialogue” with Georgia or a membership action plan for Ukraine.?
President Saakashvili said in the interview with Imedi TV that although majority of NATO-member states are in favor of ?Georgia?s immediate membership? there are ?two-or three NATO-member countries? which are hesitant.
?So we need to work with these [hesitant] countries,? he added.
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