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EU grants and loans are used as blackmail against Georgia, says PM

Irakli Kobakhidze, Georgian Prime Minister

28 November 2024 19:37 (UTC +04:00)

Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze argued that European politicians and bureaucrats have been “meddling in the parliamentary elections” and are now “attacking the legitimate choice of the people” and even “attacking the OSCE/ODIHR Election Observation Mission, which assessed the elections as competitive, with exactly the same fervor as the leaders of the radical opposition in Georgia", APA reports citing Civil.ge.

He added that EU grants and loans are used as blackmail against Georgia. He said in 2021, two weeks before the elections, the EU “threatened” to stop a 75 million EUR loan to Georgia, and later, before the 2024 elections, they “took similar actions” which failed “to influence the choice of the Georgian people.”

Kobakhidze said that the candidate status was also used to pressure Georgia after the war in Ukraine began to “organize a revolution” in Georgia with the help of non-governmental organizations “funded by the EU.” This, according to Kobakhidze, led to radicalization and polarization in Georgia.

“The opening of negotiations is now being used as a tool to blackmail our country and to divide our society, just as the candidate status was used before. This is also a completely artificial phenomenon, especially since the date of opening negotiations doesn’t depend on the date of accession,” Kobakhidze claimed. He said Georgia managed to complete each step towards the EU quicker or as quickly as other accession candidates.

Based on this assertion, Kobakhidze said that “from a technical point of view” the completion of accession negotiations takes 1.5-2 years. Since the EU doesn’t plan to expand until 2030, “blackmailing with this issue” today is “extremely offensive” but also irrelevant, he argued.