Ruling party head says gov’t following EU conditions “diligently”, hopes for “positive” political decision from EU

Irakli Kobakhidze, the chairman of the ruling Georgian Dream party, on Tuesday said the Georgian government was following “diligently” each recommendation of the European Union for granting the country the membership candidate status, and expressed his hope for a “positive” political decision from the bloc.

In his remarks over the matter, Kobakhidze noted the decision of the European Council to grant Ukraine the membership candidate status - in the same decision that delayed the status for Georgia until the conditions are met - was “completely political” as the country was in a state of war, and not granting the status would have been “absolutely incomprehensible”.

But Moldova is a member state of the Commonwealth of Independent States. The CIS is the largest international association under the Russian umbrella. The constitution of Moldova says that it will never become a member of NATO, it has the worst problems in terms of corruption, fragility of institutions, etc. [...] At such a time, when you grant the candidate status to a CIS member Moldova and not to Georgia, it is absolutely clear that this was a completely political decision”, the GD official said.

On June 24, the European Council granted the membership candidate status to Ukraine and Moldova, and said it would be ready to grant the same status to Georgia once the outstanding priorities outlined by the European Commission would be addressed by the Georgian government.