Georgian parliament speaker Shalva Papuashvili on Tuesday discussed the implementation of the European Union’s 12-point conditions for the country’s membership candidate status and bilateral parliamentary cooperation in a Tbilisi meeting with members of the EU-Georgia parliamentary association committee.
In a tweet following the meeting with MEPs Marina Kaljurand and Sven Mikser, Papuashvili said he had held a “cordial and frank” discussion with Kaljurand, who serves as the chair of the committee facilitating EU-Georgia relations, and Mikser - the EU rapporteur on Georgia.
Met with MEPs @MarinaKaljurand, Chair of the ????????-???????? Parliamentary Association Committee & @svenmikser, Rapporteur on Georgia. Had cordial and frank discussion on ????????'s progress in implementing the European Union recommendations & bilateral parliamentary ties. pic.twitter.com/OskLemg38E
— Shalva Papuashvili ???????? (@shpapuashvili) September 20, 2022
The MEPs also met with 13 representatives of Georgia’s domestic opposition behind closed doors, and are also scheduled to hold a discussion with the head of the ruling Georgian Dream party, Irakli Kobakhidze, later on Tuesday.
In the wake of its June decision to grant Georgia the European perspective, the European Council gave the country several months to address 12 conditions to receive the membership candidate status next year, with the articles involving the country’s judiciary, electoral system, deoligarchisation, depolarisation of the domestic political environment and others.
In response to the EU move and in a bid to meet the conditions, the ruling party presented its strategy for fulfilling the articles in June and invited the opposition in several working groups to jointly address the conditions.
However, the largest opposition group, the United National Movement, and two other opposition parties - Strategy Agmashenebeli and Lelo for Georgia - have refused to get involved in the process and instead launched a parallel working group, receiving backlash from a part of domestic politicians and the civil sector, as well as foreign officials.