“In these extraordinarily difficult circumstances, our responsibility was to shield our country from calamity and to preserve peace within it, and that was no simple task,” declared Georgia’s Foreign Minister Maka Botchorishvili, speaking during a parliamentary interpellation.

Botchorishvili argued that Georgia must not, through its own statements and actions, create additional threats for a country already facing more than enough security challenges of its own.

She maintained that any responsible government would act precisely as the Georgian Dream government acts.

“Twenty per cent of our country is under occupation. Our country faces security challenges of an exceptional order; challenges that no European country faces today. Under these conditions, before taking any action, making any statement, or advancing any step, we are obliged to think at least twice as hard as others would, if not many times more. We must be far more cautious, all the more so given the manipulative and thoroughly distorted presentation of facts that we witness from your side today. It is simply unacceptable that, through our statements and actions, we add further risk to a country already facing numerous security challenges.

Our country is being punished for the laws that a legitimate parliament, exercising a legitimate right in the interests of Georgia and Georgian society, passed. Passing laws is an entirely normal activity in any country. Yet it is only in Georgia’s case that an elected parliament exercising its lawful authority and passing legislation has proven so disastrous for our international relations. I was among those who voted for those laws, sitting here in this very chamber, as we debated legislation which I believed then and believe deeply now was necessary, and remains necessary, for the security and stability of our country. I would participate in that same process today in exactly the same way, so that our country and our country’s politics remain free from external interference, for that brings nothing good, and so that foreign influence in our country is transparent.

When people assure us that they love the Georgian people and Georgia more than I do or you do, I do not believe it. No one will convince me of that. Nor will anyone convince me that any parliamentarian or actor, of whatever nationality, bears greater responsibility towards our country than you and I do. Accordingly, our responsibility in these very difficult circumstances was, first and foremost, to protect our country from disaster, to preserve peace within it. That was no simple task then. It is no simple task today. Every day, every minute, not only the Foreign Ministry but many other agencies work without sleep so that our country may have peace. These are real challenges for us; the threats are real, and we genuinely have to confront and work against those threats daily.

If you cannot see this, that is deeply regrettable. However, a great part of our society sees it very clearly, assesses it very clearly, and that is reflected in the support which truly underpins the Georgian Dream government,” Botchorishvili stated.