Pawel Herczynski, the Ambassador of the European Union to Georgia, emphasized that the European Union will closely monitor not only the elections themselves but the entire electoral campaign.

He expressed hope for equal conditions during the elections and emphasized that violence is unacceptable in any democratic country.

“As you all have seen, free and fair elections is one of the nine steps that has been identified by the European Commission and supported by EU member states as a very important element that will be watching very closely.

I know that the Georgian government has already committed to asking OSCE/ODIHR for a long-term observation, and I know that all our member states are supporting this. In case of countries that are members of OSCE. It is OSCE that is responsible for long-term observations. But the discussions are ongoing among member states if and how the European Union also take part in election observations.

Once again, I want to stress that we will be watching not only the elections themselves, not only the election day but also the whole electoral campaign very closely. We sincerely hope that there will be a levelling playing field, that every political party will have enough space in order to engage and present their programs, and that first and foremost, there will be no violence. Because electoral violence is absolutely unacceptable in any democratic country,” the Ambassador stated.