Ruling party Chairman: President briefing “directed against” EU membership candidate status for Georgia

President Salome Zourabichvili’s briefing on Tuesday was “directed against” Georgia receiving the European Union membership candidate status, Irakli Kobakhidze, the Chairman of the ruling Georgian Dream party, said on Wednesday.

In response to Zourabichvili’s comments that criticised both the Government and a part of the domestic opposition, Kobakhidze called the President’s comments on the current reality of the EU membership candidate status process a “message box of the radical opposition”.

The ruling party official said in his press briefing the President’s assessment of the process and Georgia’s chances in receiving the status repeated “the lies serving as basis for the anti-state campaign of the National Movement [opposition party] and its satellites”.

Kobakhidze said Zourabichvili’s comments on Georgia having been left with “only a small chance” of receiving the candidate status - which she related to the Government’s “doubtful” decisions over the years and the opposition’s “consistent work of spreading misinformation” - represented the “anti-state rhetoric of the radical opposition”.

In her briefing on Tuesday, Zourabichvili claimed the ruling party “should have done more” to maintain its earlier “leading position” for European integration ahead the fellow Associated Trio countries Moldova and Ukraine, stressing the Government’s “inactivity” had resulted in the approval of the June 9 European Parliament resolution that urged the Georgian authorities to “refrain from interfering in media freedom or pursuing politically motivated judicial cases against media owners or representatives”.

The President also criticised what she called a “radical wing” of the domestic Georgian opposition for their “consistent work of spreading misinformation”, which she said had played a “damaging role” in the ongoing consideration of the country’s membership bid. The President urged the parties to “stop providing destructive information” at this “crucial moment” for “their own political interests in destabilising the Government”.