FM Maka Botchorishvili: Brussels bureaucracy has no willingness to understand what Georgia and its government are actually doing

“There is no readiness within the Brussels bureaucracy to properly understand what Georgia and its government are doing,” Georgia’s Foreign Affairs Minister, Maka Botchorishvili, stated on the television programme Imedi LIVE.

“On the contrary, there are people there today who are using the Georgian issue to serve very narrow political interests, interests that do not include the security and stability of our country,” Botchorishvili stated.

She further noted that it is a regrettable reality that certain forces, including within the Brussels bureaucracy, have no need for a stable Georgia and do not see the country as a bridge of stability.

“What we are doing, which means safeguarding our country’s security and stability above all else, precisely by protecting our political processes from external interference, is the right course of action that any responsible government can take in defence of its own country. Those who find themselves in direct conflict with all of this will naturally dislike it. There will naturally be criticism. Naturally, none of this will be seen for what it is: steps taken to defend our sovereignty and to eliminate external interference in our domestic politics,” Botchorishvili said.

The head of the foreign ministry also warned that further attempts would be made to portray all of this as a continuation of democratic backsliding and a policy of turning away from Europe.

“How many times can we supposedly be turning our backs on Europe? It is extraordinary, the way they see, and the way they try to see, something that is really quite straightforward: the exercise of our country’s sovereign rights, in the service of its stability and security. This is a very simple logic within which Georgia’s government operates today, and it is not nearly as difficult to see and understand as it appears from certain offices in Brussels,” Botchorishvili declared.