"Georgia Should Not Beg for Candidate Status for EU Membership" - Speaker of the Parliament

Papuashvili on Georgia’s EU Accession

On August 9th, the Speaker of the Georgian Parliament, Shalva Papuashvili, stated that there is a possibility of an “unfair decision” for Georgia regarding its candidacy status in the EU. He expressed hope that EU member states would transcend their party affiliations and make an objective, fair decision. According to Papuashvili, it would be the right move to place Georgia on the same level as Ukraine and Moldova.

“If they have candidate status today, then Georgia should have it too. If negotiations are open with them, they should be open with Georgia as well. This would be a fair decision based on objective justice and truth. As for the possibility of an unfair decision, such a possibility exists. Last year, we saw an unfair decision when countries following Georgia in the trio [Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine – simultaneously seeking candidate status in the EU] were prioritized over Georgia. They were granted candidate status, but the leader was not. I hope that a fair decision will be made this time,” Papuashvili stated.

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According to him, Georgia has made progress regarding European recommendations, and the only hope the country has now is to await a fair decision.

“It is impossible to make the Georgian people unhappy, who by all objective assessments are leaders among these three countries. There cannot be such injustice towards the Georgian people. By the end of the year, we hope that a fair decision will be made in Brussels to grant Georgia candidate status for accession to the European Union. This will be an important political step, but ultimately, we aim to initiate negotiations with the European Union for membership,” Papuashvili stated. According to him, the country was ready to receive the status as early as June of last year. This, he says, was confirmed by a report published in January, “which indicated that we were ahead of Ukraine and Moldova and were ten steps ahead of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which received candidate status in December.”