Day: October 30, 2024
On October 30, the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice-President of the European Commission, Josep Borrell, and the European Commissioner for Neighborhood and Enlargement, Olivér Várhelyi, held a press conference on the EU’s 2024 Enlargement Report. HR/VP Borrell spoke extensively about the Georgian parliamentary elections, calling for an investigation into the irregularities and noting that the Georgian authorities have “moved away from the EU” with recent actions and legislative decisions. The Enlargement Report, he says, offers the path for “re-engagement.”
HR/VP Borrell stated in his opening statement that “Georgia has conducted parliamentary elections which were marked by serious irregularities and this needs to be investigated and addressed in a transparent and independent manner. I’m not going to go through these irregularities mentioning one by one, but there are many, some of them are grave. It’s important to remark that independent observers have not declared elections to be free and fair, neither the contrary. So, we are in the zone that requires investigation in order to clarify what’s happened, which is the scope of irregularities and how this has been affecting the results.”
He further noted that the elections “consolidates a trend that we have seen by the Georgian authorities in the recent months, moving the country away from European Union, away from its values and its principles. Our report offers a clear path for reengagement, should there be a political will from Georgian leadership. We are offering a clear path for reengagement on the way to the European Union.”
As for future actions expected from Georgia, Borrell stressed: “The repeal of the Law on Foreign Influence, which has a chilling effect on civil society and media organizations, and of the law on the so-called family values, because discrimination is not a value in our European Union family, these will be the first signs of concrete commitment from the Georgian leadership. It’s very important to follow closely the events that will come in the next days about the investigation and clarification of the irregularities that has been remarked by the electoral observation teams.”
During the Q&A section of the conference, HR/VP Borrell was asked about Prime Minister Viktor Orbán’s visit to Tbilisi after the elections, to which he replied “it [was] only under the framework of their bilateral relations between Hungary and Georgia. And as you know the foreign policy of the European Union doesn’t prevent member states from having their own foreign policy. And I see that several times that some members states have different approaches to a same question.”
He added that the position of the European Union has been clear by the recent statement, noting that the EU expects “the Central Electoral Commission of Georgia [to] investigate these irregularities, which has been reported… In the core of the [observer’s] report there is a long list of considerations about what was not good, not only in the election day, but in the previous days. The whole process has been marked, observer says, by a tense environment and procedurally inconsistences, particularly on the public sector employees, confiscation of ID cards and intimidation, concerns about the ability of the voters to cast their votes freely.”
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- Prosecutors in country of Georgia investigate alleged election “falsification” CBS News
- Partial recount confirms ruling party won Georgia election, electoral commission says FRANCE 24 English
- Georgian president won’t recognize parliamentary election result and calls for a protest The Associated Press