The Georgian Dream will not even consider any of the National Movement’s and Lelo’s initiatives concerning Ukraine, Parliament Chairman Shalva Papuashvili stated when asked by reporters about the opposition’s initiative concerning Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy addressing the Parliament of Georgia.

According to him, the Parliament of Georgia was approached by Lelo and the National Movement, rather than Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.

“Ukraine has been under Russian aggression for three weeks now. We are all observing this war. What we see from a part of our opposition – this concerns the National Movement and Lelo in particular –is an attempt to generate hysteria, to precipitate what we have been talking about, and unfortunately, all of these signs are confirmed by their actions, aimed at upsetting the situation heresomehowand dragging Georgia into something irreversible. Therefore, we have said that we will not even enter into discussions concerning the initiatives of this part of the opposition. They demanded to hold an extraordinary session, and so forth. We can see the goal behind this, and we have noted this goal on numerous occasions. The goal is to cause unrest and drag the country into war, into an armed conflict, and of course, we will not allow this to happen.

As for sincere wishes and attitudes, you are aware that we sent the first shipment of humanitarian aid from the Parliament a short while ago. This was a sum of money that was collected – the opposition did not participate in this case as well. So, this really shows the true intentions of this part of the opposition– it is just PR, and as for real help and support, they show no desire for it. If someone really wants to support Ukraine, they must do so with their actions rather than loud statements.

It is absurd that a part of the Georgian opposition comes out on behalf of the Ukrainian authorities and talks about who wants what, whether they want to make an address or something else. They did not even ask the Ukrainian authorities. This too shows the true goal behind this – once again, this is to generate hysteria, and so on,” Papuashvili stated.

In addition, the Chairman of Parliament was curious about what sort of a connection a member of the Parliament of Georgia might have with the administration of a foreign country.

“There has been no communication between the Ukrainian and Georgian authorities regarding this issue. We are not going to introduce any kind of initiative. Over the past three weeks, we have been demonstrating one thing – that we are focused on providing real help, in contrast to this part of the opposition, which is distinguished only by their loud statements. The real help that Georgia can provide is our vote in international organizations. Our voteis worth as much as that of other countries. Political support and, of course, humanitarian aid is the real help that we can provide. As regards Zelenskyy’s address, I think you are mistaking the National Movement and Lelo for Zelenskyy. Zelenskyy has not reached out to us – we were approached by Lelo and the National Movement, and the Georgian Dream will not even consider any of the National Movement’s and Lelo’s initiatives concerning Ukraine,” Papuashvili stated.