Saakashvili Speaks of ‘Multi-Vector Security’

President Saakashvili said on April 4 that although Georgia’s top priority is to join NATO, it adheres to “a multi-vector security policy,” which envisages close cooperation with neighboring South Caucasus countries and Turkey.

“I am sure, the time will come when we will manage to establish good military cooperation with the Russian Federation as well,” Saakashvili said.

The president also noted that Georgia is due to become an official candidate for NATO membership “in a very limited period of time.”
Saakashvili was speaking while meeting with newly recruited would-be officers, who will be enlisted into the Georgian army after undergoing a seven-month training course. The meeting took place in Varketili district, a suburb of Tbilisi, where a groundbreaking ceremony for the construction of apartment buildings for army officers was held. The State has pledged to provide free housing to officers as part of a package of benefits to attract qualified professionals to the armed forces.

Saakashvili told the trainee officers that Georgia currently faces “huge challenges.”

“Georgia is one of the major footholds in a security and stability arch,” he said. “Our country, on the one hand is a guarantee for stability and an example of development, but on the other hand, because of this, it is at the same time under huge threat.”
 
“But the main thing that we should do in this difficult world of challenges,” he said, “is to protect Georgia’s territorial integrity and to contribute to international peacekeeping processes. We are sure that we will manage to do it well.”

“We are threatened with the partition of our country,” he told the recruits. “I want everyone to know that the time when the fate of Georgia is determined abroad is over. We have not and will never have any territories to give away. Everybody should understand this. They should accept us as a partner and a friend.”

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