Wall Street Journal: “Georgia Remains Westward Bound”

Georgia’s path toward European integration is steadfast and irreversible, says Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili, who put pen to paper and wrote and opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal this week.

The Prime Minister’s frankly honest dialogue touches upon the recent ministerial shuffle, confronts allegations Georgia was "at risk of falling under Russia’s spell” and outlines that Georgia’s foreign-policy orientation "isn’t defined by a few individuals or even by the government—it is defined by the Parliament of Georgia and is a matter of strong cross-party consensus”.

It expresses the incontrovertible will of the Georgian people, who consistently state with margins of 80% their unambiguous ambition to return fully to the European family. Georgia’s path toward European and Euro-Atlantic integration is steadfast and irreversible.”

The Georgian official said: "Internationally, however, in the context of widespread angst about Russia’s influence over its neighbours and an understandable—if regrettable—overshadowing of developments in Georgia by those in Ukraine, scaremongering over our foreign-policy orientation is powerful.”

"Equally, we won’t allow scaremongering to get in the way of our reforms and European integration. From the start, the approach of this government has been to take concrete actions to improve the lives of our people and meet the substantial criteria for European and Euro-Atlantic integration.”

Read the full article here: www.online.wsj.com