On December 28, the Georgian ambassadors gathered for the traditional annual Ambassadorial conference. This year, the theme of the meeting was “Georgia’s Foreign Policy Priorities in the Modern Geopolitical Reality.”
The Ambassadorial takes place in conditions of unprecedented foreign policy crisis and growing international isolation, following the GD government’s U-turn on EU accession and the decisions of the EU, individual European states, and the U.S. to sanction Georgian political and police officials due to a violent crackdown on the peaceful protesters. Hundreds of Foreign Ministry civil servants have signed letters dissociating themselves from the GD’s turn away from Europe, three ambassadors and one charge d’affaires stood down since the crackdowns began. These matters were papered over in the official release.
GD’s Minister of Foreign Affairs, Maka Botchorishvili, opened the event and spoke of the current situation using euphemisms, blaming it on current global “complexities,” calling on the diplomats to show “courage,” speaking about the need to “protect the national interests” and highlighting the importance of “robust state institutions” for that objective.
Botchorishvili noted, “The ongoing processes in our region, which is at the epicenter of global politics, have the most painful impact on Georgia, and we need special caution and, at the same time, courage to protect our country’s interests in the current situation.” The GD Minister insisted that Georgia was intent on advancing European and Euro-Atlantic integration but emphasized the importance of a “firm, pragmatic and result-oriented policy” for achieving these constitutional goals. Botchorishvili also stressed the challenges of “protecting national interests” in the current geopolitical landscape and emphasized the critical role of “robust state institutions” in safeguarding Georgia’s sovereignty and stability.
“It is precisely the proper functioning of state institutions that is the most important guarantee for the protection of the sovereignty and interests of the state,” she said, emphasizing the MFA’s frontline role in ensuring “peace, stability and economic development.” She thanked Georgian diplomats for their commitment to “protecting the country’s interests.”
During the Ambassadors’ Conference, a panel discussion was also held, moderated by Maka Botchorishvili, with GD MPs Nikoloz Samkharadze, who chairs the foreign relations committee in GD’s rump parliament, Levan Makhashvili, responsible for European integration and Irakli Zarkua, GD MP known for his virulently anti-Western statements and mocking of the Western leaders as keynote speakers. According to the official release, the panel underscored the importance of the non-recognition policy and the peaceful restoration of Georgia’s territorial integrity while stressing the need to keep the Russia-Georgia conflict prominent on the international agenda.
The accession to the European Union, a process that the GD government has halted and the EU is now considering canceling altogether due to the government’s violent actions, was also touched upon. “The participants of the discussion emphasized the importance of dialogue with partners in the European integration process and the need for objective assessments of the ongoing processes and expressed the hope that the current difficulties will be overcome and that cooperation will be based on mutual respect,” reads the press release. It is also reported that the Ambassadorial noted the importance of dialogue with international partners, “balanced neighborhood policies,” and strategic cooperation with nations such as the United States and China. It was not mentioned that the U.S. had canceled its strategic partnership framework with Georgia.
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