On Thursday 8 March, Georgia's President Giorgi Margvelashvili committed to strengthening discussions on visas, although several member states (notably Germany and Sweden) complain that Georgians abuse the visa-free regime in order to lodge an asylum request.
"The Georgian government has taken an extremely active and responsible position on every issue that has been brought by our partners, and we are ready even further to do our best on working together, on having a much more effective and functioning and long-standing cooperation", Margvelashvili promised after a meeting with European Council President Donald Tusk. Tusk hailed the commitment of the Georgian authorities to continue their work with the member states "to make sure that the visa-free regime functions properly".
In January 2018, Georgia ranked sixth in terms of countries requesting asylum. Over 1,859 Georgian citizens have thus lodged a request, which makes January a record month since January 2014, the EASO states. The number of requests began to increase in mid-2017, with the trend growing since September. The country has enjoyed a visa-free regime since 28 March 2017.
Tusk and Margvelashvili also spoke about cooperation between the EU and Georgia. "We discussed the future of EU-Georgia relations, including the Georgian government's pragmatic proposals for advancing integration and cooperation with the European Union. We will work to make these ideas more concrete in the coming months", Tusk announced, without giving any further detail. He added that the EU would continue to support reforms in Georgia. According to Margvelashvili, there is an "extensive agenda of furthering our cooperation, be it in economy, in education, in research or in political partnership".
Tusk also reiterated the EU's commitment as regards work to resolve the conflicts in Georgia, and its support for the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the country within its internationally recognised borders. "We are concerned about attempts at a creeping annexation of the two breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia", he added. (Original version in French by Camille-Cerise Gessant)