CoE Secretary General Visits Georgia

TBILISI - Council of Europe (CoE) Secretary General, Thorbjorn Jagland, arrived in Georgia today to hold bilateral meetings with Georgian leaders and officials.

This morning Jagland met Georgia’s Foreign Minister, Mikheil Janelidze.

The key issuses of the meeting were Georgia – CoE co-operation, the situation in Georgia’s occupied territories, and involvement of the council in human rights protection in Georgia’s occupied Abkhazia and South Ossetia Regions.

After the face-to-face meeting, the officials held a joint press-conference.

Janelidze thanked CoE secretary General for visiting Georgia.

“Georgia has done a lot of work to get closer to European standards. We appreciate the CoE’s positive assessment of the reforms, implemented in Georgia, including October parliamentary elections,” said Janelidze.

He said that the sides discussed co-operation between Georgia and the CoE, including the implementation of the Action Plan for Georgia 2016-2019.

Jagland underlined that Georgia has achieved great progress during the last years and praised the implemented reforms in the country.

“We join your common policy to create a solid state and also to have a good security policy with the outside world,” he said.

The Secretary General spoke about the situation in Georgia’s occupied regions and said that CoE would like to closely monitor developments there.

The Secretary General will also meet the President of Georgia, Giorgi Margvelashvili, the Prime-Minister, Giorgi Kvirikashvili, and the Parliament Speaker, Irakli Kobakhidze.

Jagland will complete his visit to Georgia on January 31st.

By Thea Morrison