Georgia: A hot topic at OSCE Ministerial

Georgia’s Foreign Minister is in the Swiss city of Basel to take part in the 21^stOrganisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) Ministerial, which is due to be attended by some 50 foreign ministers.

The December 4-5 event followed on from the NATO Foreign Ministers meeting, in which Georgia’s Foreign Minister Tamar Beruchashvili attended earlier this week.

In Basel, Beruchashvili is set to discuss the current state of the region and the controversial signing of an alliance deal between Russia and breakaway Abkhazia with various foreign ministers and other officials. She is also due to hold an introductory meeting with United States (US) Secretary of State John Kerry.

First Deputy of Foreign Ministry Davit Dondua, who is part of the Georgian delegation, said the Beruchashvili and Kerry were likely to discuss new security challenges facing the region, the current situation in Georgia’s breakaway regions and humanitarian issues at the occupation line.

Important attention will also be paid to the so-called ‘Alliance and Strategic Partnership’ treaty between the Russian Federation and Georgia’s breakaway Abkhazia region, signed in Sochi on November 24.

Also on the two-day Basel visit, Minister Beruchashvili is scheduled to meet the President of Switzerland, the OSCE Secretary General and the President of the OSCE Parliamentary Assembly.

The OSCE Ministerial, held annually, provides foreign ministers and more than 70 delegations of OSCE participating States, partner countries and several international organisations an opportunity to review and assess the organization's activities during the past year and offer national viewpoints on security matters.

Georgia's Beruchashvili meets top NATO official

Meanwhile on the last day of the NATO Foreign Ministers meeting, Beruchashvili met NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg in Brussels and emphasized the new regional security challenges facing Georgia and the region resulting from the recent Russia-Abkhazia deal. How Georgia planned to implement the NATO Substantive Package it was offered at the NATO Wales Summit in September, and the country’s progress towards Euro-Atlantic integration, was also discussed.

"We were talking about new regional security challenges, which include the so-called cooperation deal between Georgia’s breakaway Abkhazia and Russia. As NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg emphasized, this contradicts the principles which are the base for cooperation within the Alliance,” Beruchashvili said.

In response, Stoltenberg assessed the Russia- breakaway Abkhazia treaty as "a specific step towards annexation of Georgia and a challenge to European and Euro-Atlantic security”.

Stoltenberg once again emphasized Georgia’s significant contribution to the global security process and thanked Georgia for its contribution to NATO-led peacekeeping missions. He praised Georgia as the largest non-NATO contributor to the International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) mission in Afghanistan.

Meanwhile in Brussels Beruchashvili held a series of bilateral meetings with other Foreign Ministers in the framework of the NATO meeting. She met her Bulgarian, Belgian, Portuguese, Lithuanian, Icelandic and Slovakian counterparts.

On a different note, after the NATO Foreign Ministers meeting, Canada's Foreign Minister John Baird wrote on his Twitter page that he recognised Georgia’s Foreign Minister was a graduate of Canada’s Carleton University and expressed support to her.

#Georgia's new FM, Tamar Beruchashvili, is a @Carleton_U alumna. Discussed Russian aggression. I offered our support. pic.twitter.com/Cbn0AKzcs2

— John Baird (@HonJohnBaird) December 3, 2014