“All this together, unfortunately, brought us to the point when the European Union stopped Georgia’s accession process. This happened in June but we were waiting for the elections,” said EU Ambassador to Georgia, Pawel Herczynski.

According to the Ambassador, it is up to each country to decide which policy it wants to pursue.

“We are proud to be the union of 27 member states. Our strength comes from unity but also from our diversity. This is why we decided to further enlarge. We have extended the possibility of becoming a member of the European Union to the countries in the East – Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia, which became candidates for EU membership. But it is for each country to decide what policy it wants to pursue, and what family it wants to join. On our side, we made it very clear that we want Georgia to become a member of the European Union, but for this, there are certain conditions that apply not only to Georgia but every country that wants to join the European family,” he said.

The Ambassador explained that the European Union is based on principles and rules and “in case a third country wants to join our family, these principles and rules should be observed.”

“Unfortunately, within the last 2 years, since Georgia was granted the candidate status, there many too many developments that were not bringing Georgia closer to the EU but contrary. We were always clear about that has to be done. Nine Steps was the guide map for Georgia.

In the last one year, not enough progress was made with regard to 9 steps. On the contrary, with many of these steps, we have backsliding. On top of it, many legislative initiatives were taken that were not in line with the EU’s norms and principles. Anti-west propaganda continued. Many conspiracy theories and lots of disinformation have been spread by the highest authorities including members of the government and the ruling party.

All this together, unfortunately, brought us to the point when the European Union stopped Georgia’s accession process. This happened in June but we were waiting for the elections. We sincerely hoped that the elections would give a new impetus to EU-Georgia relations. Instead, and unfortunately, there were serious irregularities as stated by international observers. And now the announcement of yesterday that Georgia stops its accession efforts for the next 4 years is really regrettable,” he said.