Irakli Kobakhidze announced the ruling Georgian Dream party’s decision to abort the efforts to start the accession negotiations with the EU “until 2028.” He also said the cabinet would refuse all EU budget support.
Kobakhidze announced the decision following the party consultation at the special briefing on November 28. He took the official party line that while EU membership remained the priority for 2030, this would happen only in Georgia’s terms of maintaining “dignity.” This manipulated argumentation flips the logic of EU accession, where the EU Copenhagen Criteria for functioning democracy and free market, the common regulatory framework, and the EU Council dictate the accession conditions and the regulatory framework.
Kobakhidze’s statement comes as the Georgian Dream claims victory in the October 26 elections despite concerns about vote-rigging. The opposition rejects the results and considers the parliament illegitimate, while the President’s appeal to the Constitutional Court remains, so far, unanswered. The European Parliament gave credence to these claims by adopting a resolution calling for sanctions against GD leaders and re-running the parliamentary elections.
Kobakhidze’s Statement in Detail
Irakli Kobakhidze argued that Georgia is a European country that has always looked to Europe as “the bastion of Christianity” and shares European values. He stated that the GD’s duty is to make Georgia a “full member of the European family” by 2030.
However, he noted that EU-Georgian relations should be a two-way street. As a “proud and self-respecting nation,” it is “categorically unacceptable” for Georgians to see EU integration as charity to be bestowed upon it. Kobakhidze also claimed that “European politicians and bureaucrats” are “hurling a cascade of insults” at the Georgian government.
“The ill-wishers of our country have turned the European Parliament into a naked weapon of blackmail against Georgia, which is the greatest shame for the European Union. In the last three years, the European Parliament has adopted five resolutions full of lies and insults, which were not shared by the Georgian society, the European Commission, and even the European Council,” he stressed counterfactually.
Kobakhidze argued that European politicians and bureaucrats have been “meddling in the parliamentary elections” and are now “attacking the legitimate choice of the people” and even “attacking the OSCE/ODIHR Election Observation Mission, which assessed the elections as competitive, with exactly the same fervor as the leaders of the radical opposition in Georgia.”
He added that EU grants and loans are used as blackmail against Georgia. He said in 2021, two weeks before the elections, the EU “threatened” to stop a 75 million EUR loan to Georgia, and later, before the 2024 elections, they “took similar actions” which failed “to influence the choice of the Georgian people.”
Kobakhidze said that the candidate status was also used to pressure Georgia after the war in Ukraine began to “organize a revolution” in Georgia with the help of non-governmental organizations “funded by the EU.” This, according to Kobakhidze, led to radicalization and polarization in Georgia.
“The opening of negotiations is now being used as a tool to blackmail our country and to divide our society, just as the candidate status was used before. This is also a completely artificial phenomenon, especially since the date of opening negotiations doesn’t depend on the date of accession,” Kobakhidze claimed. He said Georgia managed to complete each step towards the EU quicker or as quickly as other accession candidates.
Based on this assertion, Kobakhidze said that “from a technical point of view” the completion of accession negotiations takes 1.5-2 years. Since the EU doesn’t plan to expand until 2030, “blackmailing with this issue” today is “extremely offensive” but also irrelevant, he argued.
Moreover, the Prime Minister said that the EU “demands” from Georgia “not reforms, but such steps that would infringe on our dignity,” naming specifically the abolition of the foreign agent’s law and the anti-LGBTQ+ law, demands sanctions against the Georgian government and demanding imprisoned Mikheil Saakashvili’s release.
“Based on the above, we took the decision today not to put the agenda of opening the accession negotiations with the EU before the end of 2028. Also, until the end of 2028, we reject any budget support grant from the EU,” Kobakhidze stressed.
He argued that by 2028, Georgia would be sufficiently ready economically to join the EU in 2030. Kobakhidze pointed out that Georgia “will continue to implement the obligations based on the association agenda and the free trade agreement, as foreseen by the government’s program,” aiming to fulfill 90% of these obligations by 2028. He said Georgia will meet these commitments based on its resources and enter the EU “not as beggars […] but with dignity.”
He expressed confidence that today’s decision will help to “put the relations on a healthier footing” and show “European politicians and bureaucrats devoid of the European values” that they need to talk to Georgia in a dignified manner.
Kobakhidze concluded that by 2030, Georgia will be “better prepared than any other candidate country to join the EU.” “This is our pledge to the Georgian people, and we will fulfill it.,” said Kobakhidze.
This post is also available in: ქართული (Georgian) Русский (Russian)
