Georgian Official: U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense to Visit Tbilisi

U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia, Celeste A. Wallander, will visit Tbilisi on February 22-24, Georgia’s deputy foreign minister, Nino Kalandadze, said on Monday.

She said the visit by the U.S. delegation would be a follow up to “an agreement reached during a meeting between the Georgian and U.S. Presidents” in Washington on January 30 on “deepening cooperation in the field of defense.”

She also said that the upcoming visit was part of putting that agreement into phase of “technical implementation”.

“The United States is very much interested in increasing Georgia’s self-defense capabilities,” Kalandadze said.

During the visit, she said, the delegation would hold meetings “mainly in the Georgian Ministry of Defense in order to plan and identify concrete directions in which the defense cooperation will proceed.”