PM Irakli Garibashvili said that that anti-western rhetoric, voiced by leaders of one of the Georgian Dream coalition partners, Industrialist party, is “unacceptable”, but added that there was no need to cause much stir about it.
In series of recent media interviews MP Gogi Topadze, leader of the Industrialists party, which is a member of GD coalition, criticized Georgia’s NATO aspirations and also called for Russia-style NGO laws to impose tight control over the civil society groups.
“Industrialist party, like others in the coalition, has signed founding declaration [of the GD coalition] and they formally fully share our declared policy,” PM Garibashvili told journalists at a news conference on March 26.
“Of course I do not share Gogi Topadze’s remarks. That’s his personal views and does not represent the views of the coalition,” he said.
“I think his remarks have been excessively hyped; I would advise you not to spend too much time on this issue, because no one has any doubts about our absolutely unambiguous foreign policy; it is openly declared; this policy has been determined by the Parliament; we have full consensus about it and the Georgian government is implementing this course efficiently,” the PM said.
“I hope that batoni Gogi and the Industrialist party will reaffirm that they share fully our declared foreign policy course,” he said and added that Topadze’s remarks are “unacceptable”, but “there is nothing tragic or special” about it.
Asked if the Industrialists will again be in the same bloc with the Georgian Dream coalition in 2016 parliamentary elections, Garibashvili responded: “We will see – there is still too much time before the elections.”
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