Speaker Papuashvili: EU foreign policy, including on enlargement, is so incompetent that we can no longer take their statements seriously

“It is ludicrous that an EU Commissioner is forbidding candidate states from maintaining relations with the US administration,” Speaker of the Parliament of Georgia Shalva Papuashvili told reporters.

Papuashvili was commenting on remarks made by European Commissioner for Enlargement Marta Kos, who asserted that “countries seeking EU accession must sever ties with Donald Trump’s MAGA movement to qualify for membership.”

The Parliament Speaker noted that Brussels is attempting to issue ultimatums regarding the foreign policy and international relations of sovereign candidate states that are not even EU members yet.

“First it was China, and now they have lumped in the United States. EU foreign policy, including its enlargement agenda, is being managed so unprofessionally that we can no longer take the statements emanating from Brussels seriously.

Can you imagine an Enlargement Commissioner publicly telling nations not to engage with the US administration, when MAGA is nothing short of President Trump’s core political foundation and philosophical pillar? When they publicly urge candidate countries to shun relations with the US administration, how can anyone take them seriously?

There is a second dimension here as well. We must consider the broader context. This statement was directed primarily at Serbia. Serbia is due to host a conference shortly involving participants from the MAGA movement, and elections are scheduled in Serbia for October. This is a clear attempt to interfere in those elections under fabricated pretexts, whether it is attendance at a former official’s funeral or whether one has ties with MAGA and hosts a conference. This represents direct interference in the domestic elections of a candidate nation.

I am confident we will clearly witness Brussels attempting to meddle in Serbia’s elections, just as they attempted to meddle in Georgia’s elections. By meddling in elections, present-day Brussels is directly trampling on the very European values it preaches. The 2024 elections served as a prime example, where they crudely interfered using what they themselves label Russian methods,” Shalva Papuashvili stated.