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Day: December 5, 2023
In the months prior to the EU’s announcement of whether Georgia will receive candidate status, more Georgians were aware than ever before that the country was not yet a member of the EU.
While surveys have consistently shown that a large majority of Georgians would vote for the country’s membership in the European Union, they have also previously shown that large shares of Georgians — up to one in six — believed that the country was already a member of the EU.
Newly released data from the 2023 CRRC Georgia and Europe Foundation survey on ‘Knowledge of and attitudes towards the EU in Georgia’, collected in the spring and summer of 2023, shows that more Georgians are aware that the country is not a member state than ever before.
Survey respondents were asked whether Georgia is currently a member of the EU. The vast majority — 92% — reported that Georgia is not currently a member. This is nine percentage points higher than recorded in any other year of the survey, since 2009. It is a full 22 points higher than during the first wave of the survey in 2009.
In 2023, only 3% reported that Georgia was already a member, compared with 16% in 2017 and 2019. The closest year to the current levels was in 2015, when only 5% reported that Georgia was already part of the EU.
There has also been a corresponding decline in the share reporting uncertainty about whether Georgia is or is not a member of the EU.
In contrast to 2015, when 12% of the public was uncertain about Georgia’s membership status, only 5% were uncertain about whether Georgia is a member of the EU in 2023.
While more people are now aware of Georgia’s membership status, interest in getting more information about the EU itself has remained largely consistent between 2011 and 2023, with small fluctuations between years. For example, since 2021, interest in getting more information increased by five percentage points.
However, interest varies between different demographic groups.
Young people (18-34) are 17 percentage points more likely to be interested in information about the EU than 35-54 year olds, and 22 percentage points more than those aged 55+.
People from Tbilisi are 12 percentage points more likely to be interested in receiving more information about the EU than people living in rural regions, and 14 points more likely than people in other urban areas.
Ethnic Georgians are 13 percentage points more likely to be interested in getting more information on the EU than ethnic minorities.
People with tertiary education are 11 percentage points more likely to be interested in receiving more information on the EU than people with secondary or lower education.
While in 2023, people were more aware of Georgia’s EU membership status than ever before, the public’s interest in being informed about the EU has remained stable.
This article was written by Anano Kipiani, a researcher at CRRC Georgia, and Kristina Vacharadze, Programmes Director at CRRC Georgia. The views presented in this article are the authors’ alone, and do not necessarily reflect the views of CRRC Georgia, Europe Foundation, or any related entity.
The post Datablog | Georgians more aware of EU membership status than ever before appeared first on OC Media.
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Asian Stocks – 05-12-23
The surprise attack launched by Hamas on Israel has thrown the region into an unprecedented level of military escalation. Hamas’s army wing, the Izz ad-Din al-Qassam Brigades, infiltrated into Israel, breaching the southern border, and a bloodbath followed. According to the latest reports, Hamas terrorists had detailed maps of locations in Israel, including its military bases, hinting that the group’s assault was a long-prepared one.
A Wall Street Journal (WSJ) report revealed that the Hamas terrorists had a well-prepared infiltration route map, along with detailed maps of the towns and military bases that they targeted. Some of them had tactical guides identifying weak spots, showing the scale of planning behind the deadly attack.
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“Taken together, the documents indicate that Hamas set out from the start to target not just military installations, but to attack civilian population centres and to take hostages,” the Wall Street Journal report stated.
A map recovered from an Israeli site attacked by Hamas. | Photo: South First Responders via Wall Street Journal
Some of the documents even mentioned the number of civilians in the Israeli areas, provided detailed descriptions of the kibbutz (a Jewish settlement), and included estimates of when the Israeli army could arrive.
A 14-page document in Arabic, titled “Top Secret” and dated June 15, 2023, was also recovered from the Hamas terrorists. It described the plan to infiltrate a kibbutz and take its residents as hostages. The document also contains details of the deployment of Hamas operatives for various operations, referred to as “Hour S, Day Y”.
The Wall Street Journal quoted Michael Milshtein, a former Israeli military intelligence officer, who pointed out that this level of planning by Hamas had not been seen before. “There is nothing close to this level of planning in any of the steps Hamas had taken in the past,'” he told the newspaper.
On October 7, Hamas terrorists launched missile attacks against Israel from Gaza, and their operatives entered southern Israel, killing several citizens and taking many as hostages. In retaliation, Israel declared a ‘state of war’ and announced Operation ‘Iron Swords’ in Gaza. The attack has resulted in thousands of casualties on both sides.