“It all resembled wrestling when Brussels showed little desire to easily grant Georgia visa-free regime – whether they disliked the government or for other reasons is a matter for discussion and investigation,” stated Tea Tsulukiani, Chairperson of Georgia’s Parliamentary Temporary Investigative Commission, during a committee session examining damage caused to Georgia’s foreign policy interests by certain politicians between 2012-2025.

According to Tsulukiani, “despite Georgia being ahead of Ukraine and Moldova, Moldova satisfied Brussels’ visa-free travel requirements with a chip “taped” to old passports, while Georgia was told it wasn’t ready for visa liberalization.”

“I’ll provide an example. We already had new generation biometric passports, and a biometric passport is more than just a document; it is supported by a complete system, including databases and cutting-edge technology. We were ahead of both countries, namely Moldova. Moldova passed visa-free regime criteria with old, non-biometric passports that had a so-called chip ‘taped’ to the back page, while we were told ‘you’re not ready yet.’ There were moments at the negotiating table when everything was set out and then there was disagreement, bargaining, or negotiation. This was 2015-2016,” Tea Tsulukiani stated.