The Head of the Parliamentary Delegation to PACE, Givi Mikanadze participated in the debates concerning the sanctions against Russia.

In his address, Mikanadze informed the delegates from 45 countries about the preventive measures undertaken by Georgia at the legal and practical levels in view to prevent the circumvention of the sanctions imposed against Russia by the Western countries.

He overviewed the monitoring of the sanctions by the high officials of the USA, EU, and the UK during the visits to Georgia and their positive assessment of the activities conducted by the Georgian Government; he also provided information about the steps taken by the Customs Department of the Finance Ministry in this regard.

“Since Russia’s illegal full-scale, and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine, the international community has put in place an unprecedented level of sanctions.

Unfortunately, it is irrelevant to say that Ms. Yasko included Georgia, together with several member states of the Council of Europe in an attached report of the resolution as a country through which Russia evades the sanctions.

Although Georgia is not part of the implementation of sanctions, three high officials, sanctions envoys from the United States, European Union, and the United Kingdom visited Georgia to assess if there is any circumvention of the sanctions.

I will quote Mr. David O’Sullivan, EU sanctions envoy, after the investigation he carried out in Georgia. He stated, and I’m quoting that “the Georgian authorities are taking very seriously the issue of not allowing this country to be used as a platform for circumvention, and they have put in place significant measures of controlling the exports, of possible export, from Georgia of the most sensitive 38 products, and the same is true across financial sanctions, where they have put in place very close vigilance. And we are frankly impressed with the measures which they have taken.”

As a final assessment, the three high officials have left the country with a general, very positive impression that the Georgian authorities are making sure that Georgia is not used as a platform for circumvention of sanctions.

In addition, the Georgian minister of finance has informed society and partners that since imposing sanctions on Russia by Western countries, there has been no single case of violation. The ministry has established a special unit responsible for monitoring of movement of goods and persons on the territory of Georgia controlled by the central government. The minister presented concrete figures, proving Georgia’s full commitment to preventing any attempt to circumvent sanctions; particularly, in two years since Russian aggression started in Ukraine, the customs service has recorded over 1800 cases of when goods and transportation were denied to pass via Georgia, as well as in more than 1000 cases there was custom service decision on refusal to export or re-export goods as all these cases were the attempt to circumvent the sanctions.

In line with the above-mentioned, all international partners and high-level officials who are directly in charge of monitoring the implementation of sanctions are recognizing positive cooperation by Georgian authorities to prevent any circumvention of sanctions,” Mikanadze stated.

The debates were held within the PACE summer session, which is held on July 24-28 in Strasbourg.