Georgia and Ukraine sign Agreement to Create High-level Strategic Council
"We confirm that Ukraine is our strategic partner and also evidence that we can better fight with challenges together" noted Giorgi Gakharia, Prime Minister of Georgia when summarizing his visit to Ukraine for journalists today.
In the opinion of the Head of Government of Georgia, main directions of partnership with Ukraine are: economy, security and Euro-Atlantic integration.
Prime Minister of Georgia noted that it was the first Official Visit within the past 6 years, which resulted with an establishment of a High-Level Strategic Cooperation Council as its key outcome.
"High-level Strategic Cooperation Council is a specifically structured format, within the scope of which Georgia and Ukraine will discuss topics of bilateral relations and will achieve results together. This format has several dimensions: economy, security and Euro-Atlantic integration. We confirm that Ukraine is our strategic partner and also evidence that we will fight with challenges more effectively together. We have similar challenges towards security, predominantly manifested in the territorial integrity of our countries. We expressed gratitude to our Ukrainian colleagues for the support of territorial integrity of Georgia and pledged that Georgia will always demonstrate its unconditional support towards the territorial integrity of Ukraine in all formats" noted the Prime Minister of Georgia.
Head of Government of Georgia spoke with President of Ukraine, Head of Government and Chairman of Verkhovna Rada, noting that cooperation between the countries should become much more effective and intensive in the upcoming years.
"Both sides vividly see the importance of effective cooperation - strategic partnership between Ukraine and Georgia. We can develop faster together towards European integration and more effectively protect our territorial integrity. This support is based on our cooperation, economy, transport corridors and trade of course. President of Ukraine spoke at length about the reforms that are planned in Ukraine and requested our support in various directions. We pledged to share the experience we accumulated in recent years while reforming various areas. We will share our expertise with Ukraine and will do our best to cooperate as expected from sterling strategic partners" noted the Prime Minister of Georgia.
Head of Government of Georgia also responded to a question posed by journalists on the Russian language used for political statements by leaders after the completion of the GUAM Summit. Prime Minister of Georgia noted that GUAM is an international organization, language of which is set by the protocol and besides it was a request of the host authorities towards all participating Prime Ministers to make political statements in Russian.
"I believe that some of our opponents are trying to shift attention from substantially important topics - strategic cooperation between Georgia and Ukraine, shared goals and methods of their achievement - towards bizarre formats, which is comic. Host country, which is in the midst of a conflict with Russia, also spoke Russian and it was their request to do the same. Démarche from our side in this regard would not only be inappropriate, but counter-productive, potentially putting at stake those results that we achieved today with the Ukrainian authorities" concluded the Prime Minister of Georgia.