Georgian envoy to Russia meets Russian deputy FM in Prague

Georgian Envoy to Russia Zurab Abashidze and Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin have met in Prague, Czech Republic today  to discuss trade-economic relations, as the format of the meetings is not meant to be political.

However, Karasin and Abashidze also mentioned political issues during their comments for the media.

Karasin said that the Russian leadership “is upset” by Georgian PM Mamuka Bakhtadze’s recent speech at the UN and said that making statements against Russia “will not benefit” the normalisation of the two counties relations.

Karasin called Tatunashvili-Otkhozoria list a “dangerous precedent” which may put the Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism meetings under the question mark.

He also stated that the Russian authorities “are closely watching” Georgia’s pre-election campaign and added that the winning of the Georgian presidential candidate will be acceptable for Russia, who will be voted by most of Georgian citizens.

I hope that the pre-election campaign will not be very anti-Russian,” Karasin said.

Karasin stated that Georgia and Russia have prospects to further enhance trade-economic, transport and aviation ties.

Abashidze told the media that the trade turnover between Georgia and Russia exceeded 1 billion USD in the nine months of 2018.

He stated briefly that PM Bakhtadze’s speech included necessary messages and topics.

The so-called Abashidze-Karasin meetings format was launched in late 2012 and covers only humanitarian, trade and economic issues. In its essence, the format does not touch upon politics.