Ruling Party Honorary Chair recalls 2008 NATO Summit, claims Georgia, Ukraine were “unwanted”

Bidzina Ivanishvili, the Honorary Chair and Founder of the ruling Georgian Dream party, on Monday said that at the 2008 NATO summit when Georgia and Ukraine had not been accepted as members of the Alliance, this decision was attributed to various countries, though the reality was “completely different”.

In his interview with Imedi TV, Ivanishvili claimed that the acceptance of Georgia and Ukraine had not been rejected “by one or two countries”, but had been denied by those “who are actually the coordinators of NATO, [...] they did not want Georgia and Ukraine to join [the Alliance] due to some elementary reasons].

There is a bitter war in our neighbourhood, [...] Ukraine is in a difficult time, our friendly country is at war with Russia. Earlier, we had it [war] in 2008 [with Russia], if you remember, it's very easy to recall, as we went through very hard times”, he said.

A lot of statements are made today, if you look at the Western politicians, that they are doing everything to prevent NATO from getting involved in war with Russia. They say: we will give Ukraine weapons, we will give money, all the means, but the manpower should be only Ukraine, [...] there are a lot of statements, politicians of any level from Europe or the United States say that they will never allow NATO to get involved in a conflict with Russia”, he added.

Ivanishvili added that “this was also planned in 2008 [August war]”, as Georgia and Ukraine were “spared” for the purpose for NATO not to engage in war with Russia.