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PM: NATO Enlargement “One of the Main Reasons for Ukraine War”

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili, who is visiting Bratislava to participate in the Global Security Forum (GLOBSEC) on May 29-31, took part in a thematic discussion where he spoke about the war in Ukraine, granting of candidate status to Georgia, international sanctions against Russia and the draft law on “foreign agents.”

War in Ukraine

“The war that we are seeing now in Ukraine is catastrophic, of course. Thousands of people are dying every day,” PM Garibashvili said, speaking about Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. When asked by the moderator why he thinks Russia started the war with Ukraine in 2022, the Georgian Prime Minister replied: “I think everybody knows the reason. One of the main reasons was NATO, NATO enlargement.”   

“I do not want to speculate, and I don’t want to quote the statements of the Russian government, but one of the reasons was Ukraine’s will and determination to become a member of NATO. Therefore, we see the consequences,” he said, adding that he could not see any effort or will on either side to end the war.

“We respect everyone, we support Ukraine, we support Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, we want to see that peace is restored and Ukraine’s territorial integrity is restored very soon, but I want to talk about my country first,” the PM said, focusing on the 2008 Georgia-Russia war.

“We had very difficult days back in 2008. Today maybe some people forgot that 20% of our territory is occupied by Russia and in 2008, after the war, Russia did not leave our territory; on the contrary, they stayed, they built two military bases on our soil, and this is the result of that devastating war”, PM Garibashvili said, stressing “that time the world did not pay enough attention to that aggression of Russia; no one imposed sanctions on Russia.”

Garibashvili said that although Georgia has a well-trained and well-equipped army, “still it is a small nation.” “Therefore, I think, it is in every government’s interest, especially when you are a small country, when you are not a member of EU or NATO, when you do not have any security guarantees, but that war was devastating for us.” When asked whether 2008 war was an act of an unprovoked aggression, PM said “I don’t want to go into details, because we have our own view”, adding: “If we were in the government, if our government was in power, I think, we would do everything possible to avoid that war,” he added.

“My end goal and the end goal of every Georgian and the end goal of our government is to achieve de-occupation by peaceful means”, PM Garibashvili said, noting that the current government has introduced a new approach “called strategic patience” due to which Georgia managed to secure peace and stability.

“In the modern history, since we regained our independence in the nineties, this is the only uninterrupted peaceful period in Georgia. This is the only period Georgia had not any wars, any escalation, any conflict and did not lose any territory,” the Prime Minister said.

EU Candidate status

The Prime Minister said that it was an “unfair” and “unjustified” decision not to grant candidate status to Georgia along with Ukraine and Moldova last year. “What kind of message are you sending to Russia that we are kind of abandoning the country which is two-three times ahead of Moldova and Ukraine,” he said.

The Georgian Prime Minister also noted that “if we are talking about merit-based approach, Georgia was and still is two-three times ahead of both countries. So, we’d rather ask the same question to our European friends why they did not give the status to Georgia. We have no explanations, no arguments,” he said, adding that “Moldova and Ukraine were also given these priorities, but they were given the status in advance. That’s the difference.”

“That’s why we did not understand why. The only explanation we heard was that Ukraine is in war. We were also in war in 2008 and 20% of our territory is occupied by Russia. So, what’s the point? Moldova is in difficult situation. So, there is no rationale, I would say so. So, if Georgia does not get this status by the end of this year, this would be a huge mistake,” PM Garibashvili said.

He continued that the Georgian government “immediately started” working on the fulfillment of the 12 priorities. “By June, everything will be finalized except one recommendation, which is so called de-polarization or end of polarization,” he said, addressing Western partners to grant the status, which “will end polarization in Georgia.”

Asked about de-oligarchization in the context of fulfilling the priorities, PM Garibashvili said that Georgia took the example from Ukraine, developed a draft law and sent it to the Venice Commission for feedback. “I think, we are moving in the right direction. Although we had some criticism that Georgia does not need that law, we do not understand why we do not need that law anymore.”   

The Prime Minister stressed that presently, former Defense Minister and founder of Formula TV is “a real” oligarch in Georgia. When the moderator said he had in mind the founder of the Georgian Dream party, Bidzina Ivanishvili, PM Garibashvili said: “Once we adopt this law, everything will be clear and we will demystify all these accusations, groundless, without any arguments and facts. And since you asked about the role of the founder of our party, Mr. Ivanishvili, he did lots of charity for Georgia.”   

Asked what Georgia would do if it did not get the status by the end of the year, PM Garibashvili replied: “Georgia will continue moving forward with our reforms, development, etc. But I think, in this complex geopolitical situation, not granting EU status to Georgia, which is a top performer, out of this Associated Trio, will be a huge geopolitical mistake.”     

Sanctions against Russia

Speaking about the sanctions imposed on Russia, PM Garibashvili noted that it would have “a significant impact” on Georgian economy. “So, my point is, when we discussed this situation, we said we will fully align with international financial sanctions, and we are doing that, the U.S. State Department, the EU institutions, everybody acknowledged that Georgia fully complies with international financial sanctions,” he said.

He also noted that when it comes to trade relations with Russia, the situation is different. “EU does not stop trade relations, the U.S, other countries, so why Georgia should be an exception?” he asked, adding “this is one of the reasons. Another reason is that we were quite disappointed that nobody took seriously the invasion of Georgia in 2008… the world at that time did not think that the war was that serious.” The Prime Minister noted that the EU paid 2.5 trillion EUR to Russia after the war.

Garibashvili stressed that the former Georgian government also tried to restore trade and economic relations with Russia. “They opened visa free regime to Russia [after the war] and sold strategic infrastructure assets from energy infrastructure to Russian state-owned companies. So, this is the reality,” he said.  

“Georgia chose a very reasonable, pragmatic and quite unique path. On the one hand, we tried to navigate from this difficult situation, and on the other hand, we are advancing on our EU path. And we are delivering concrete, tangible results,” Garibashvili said, adding: “if anybody in our country, any government in our country delivers something tangible on our European integration path, this is Georgian Dream government.”

Draft law on foreign agents

The moderator of the discussion also asked the Prime Minister about the draft law on “foreign agents” initiated by the ruling majority, which was later withdrawn amid public protests.

“What’s the point of talking about something which has already been solved? This law was not adopted, we closed the chapter; so, we would rather focus on more serious stuff.” He said that “many other countries and the European Parliament also considered adopting a similar law. “But I do not want to go into details, to speculate on that. There was this initiative and we withdrew it and this topic is over,” the Prime Minister responded.

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

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