skip to content
News

Irish FM Visits Georgia

Foreign Minister of Ireland, Micheál Martin, met with his Georgian counterpart, Eka Tkeshelashvili in Tbilisi on November 20.

“We have repeatedly supported Georgia’s territorial integrity and we will continue to do so,” the Irish Foreign Minister told journalists after the meeting.

He said that Ireland “fully supported” the EU French presidency’s peace mission, which he said “did end the fighting and did see substantial Russian withdrawal from the areas around South Ossetia and Abkhazia.”

Ireland has four observers as part of the EU Monitoring Mission in Georgia (UEMM).

“Unfortunately, the [EU] monitoring mission and indeed OSCE military monitors are not allowed to fulfill their mandates fully and that’s something the European Union will continue to press for,” Micheál Martin said.

He also said that EU’s decision to resume partnership talks with Russia was not something that was taken “easily.”

“There was a considerable discussion… and at the end of the day Ireland supported the French Presidency’s position that dialogue was important,” Martin said. “There needs to be a framework to facilitate discussions around new agreement [with Russia], but not in a context ‘as business as usual.’ Obviously the conflict in Georgia is a backdrop to these discussions. Russia will be firmly reminded about EU’s position in relation to Georgia’s territorial integrity.”

He also said that Ireland was “supportive of enhancing relations between Georgia and EU within the framework of the European Neighbourhood Policy.”

The Georgian Foreign Minister said at the joint news conference after the meeting that Ireland was “a good example of economic development” for Georgia.

“This is the country which has very interesting model of compatibility between the economic freedoms and EU regulations which is very interesting model for us,” she said and added that the two countries on November 20 signed an agreement on avoiding double taxation.

She also said that Georgia planned to open its embassy in Dublin in 2009.

This post is also available in: ქართული (Georgian) Русский (Russian)

Back to top button