Georgian parliament speaker: “majority” EU conditions will be fulfilled by end of December

Georgian parliament speaker Shalva Papuashvili on Thursday said the majority of the European Union conditions for granting Georgia the membership candidate status would be fulfilled by the end of December and noted that the implementation of the rest depended on the assessments of the Council of Europe's Venice Commission and the constructive cooperation of the opposition. 

Papuashvili said the parliament was awaiting the Commission’s assessments on the deoligarchisation bill, the judicial reform and the election code, pointing out that they expected to receive an answer on the latter “in a few days”, after which they would continue working on its implementation.

The parliament speaker highlighted the importance of constructive cooperation with the opposition in two additional topics to gather the “relevant” majority to elect the non-judge members of the high council of justice and a public defender.

Papuashvili noted that “based on the past practice” there would be no response from the Commission regarding the judicial reform until the end of the year.