Georgian Parliament Speaker accuses Brussels of weaponising visa liberalisation

Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili on Monday claimed that Brussels was using the issue of visa liberalisation as a tool of political pressure.

In his remarks, Papuashvili argued that the EU had previously applied similar pressure by withholding Georgia’s EU candidate status.

“When a person doesn’t want to see a stone on the road, they won’t see it. When the aim is political pressure, anything can be used as a tool. We witnessed how candidate status was used in this way. In June 2022, we were denied candidate status, and no one explained why”, the Speaker said.

Papuashvili further pointed to June 2022, when Georgia was denied EU candidate status despite, in his view, meeting the necessary criteria.

“In June 2022, we were not granted [the EU membership] candidate status, and no one could explain why. In October of the same year, the Commission published a report that we were ahead of Moldova and Ukraine, yet we hadn’t received the status earlier. Why weren’t we granted it? The answer is simple - it was a tool of pressure to push Georgia toward escalation with Russia. There was no other formal reason”, he continued.

Papuashvili claimed that Brussels had similarly instrumentalised accession talks, deviating from the EU’s core values and principles.

“The same happened with [accession] talks. This is how instrumentalisation works. That’s why we say that Brussels is going beyond the EU’s values and the fundamental principles on which the European Union has been built. There is an attempt from Brussels to use these instruments, since they exist, for pressure”, he concluded.