Polish, Lithuanian President to Attend GUAM Summit
Presidents of Poland Lech Kaczyński and of Lithuania Valdas Adamkus will arrive in Georgia to participate in a GUAM summit, which will open in Batumi, Adjara Autonomous Republic, on July 1.
Ukrainian and Azerbaijani Presidents Viktor Yushchenko and Ilham Aliyev will be in Batumi as well for the summit. Moldovan Prime Minister, Zinaida Greceanii, was initially expected to attend, but the country’s interior minister will now take her place.
GUAM is a grouping formally made up of Georgia, Ukraine, Azerbaijan and Moldova. The latter, however, has recently distanced itself from the organization.
In a newspaper interview in March, Moldovan President Vladimir Voronin criticized GUAM and said that the group had failed to bring any tangible results.
“When GUAM was being set up, it set different goals. There were discussions about the construction of the Odessa-Brody-Gdansk oil pipeline. But when I looked at the route [of the proposed pipeline], it bypassed Moldova,” Voronin told the Russian daily Kommersant. “On top of this, other strange things started to happen last year. Talks about setting up [GUAM] peacekeeping forces started. I asked why? And I was told: we all have conflicts. So what? We already have internationally recognized [Russian] peacekeeping forces, so why do we need more? Thank God GUAM decisions are taken on a consensus basis and we refused to sign the document; the proposal was thwarted.”
The Lithuanian president’s press office reported that Valdas Adamkus would raise GUAM activities “aimed at strengthening the development of energy and transport projects in the region” and GUAM relations with the UN, OSCE, EU and NATO.
