Georgia

Lord Kilclooney Excerpts

Wednesday 3rd July 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

My Lords, it is entirely fair to say that Ukraine is considerably behind Georgia in many ways. There was a free and fair election in Georgia last spring which resulted in a change of Government. The Georgian Government have just announced that on 31 October this year there will be a presidential election. Of course, that is not to say that it is a perfect democracy. There are a number of issues, including cases against members of the previous Administration, about which we are concerned. However, when I was in Tbilisi I had lunch at the British embassy with MPs both from the governing party and from the opposition. There are many countries in what was formerly the Soviet Union in which one could not do that.

[Lord Kilclooney]

My Lords, given that the European Union accepted Cyprus as a member even though its Government did not govern the entire island of Cyprus, why does the European Union welcome Croatia and not Georgia as a member?

[Lord Wallace of Saltaire]

I note some of the unspoken sentiments behind the noble Lord’s question. As he knows well, the process of admission to the European Union is long and arduous. Georgia is at a very early stage in that process. Georgia’s administrative capability and economic changes and the judicial, rule of law issues that it will have to go through mean that any approach to the European Union will be relatively long, but that is also true for some of the western Balkan countries.