President Selects Davit Bakradze as Ambassador to UN Despite Misgivings

President Salome Zurabishvili selected Davit Bakradze as the new Georgian Ambassador to the United Nations in New York despite having serious misgivings about his competency.

Natia Sulava, the Head of the Presidential Administration, made the announcement on 31 August but stressed that the President’s “negative assessment” of Bakradze’s time as the Georgian Ambassador to the U.S. stands.

President Zurabishvili voiced such concerns during an interview with the Georgian Public Broadcaster shortly after she received Bakradze’s candidacy on 15 July. During the interview, the President stated in reference to Bakradze that she does not believe a person who “did nothing” during his time as Ambassador to the U.S. should be appointed to the United Nations.

Sulava explained that President Zurabishvili “does not consider it appropriate to appoint him as a permanent representative to the United Nations, while a war is going on in our neighboring and friendly country [of Ukraine].”

She underscored that the President had voiced this position on numerous occasions in both public and informal settings. Sulava concluded by highlighting that to date President Zurabishvili has approved every official nomination sent to her by the Government of Georgia.

Bakradze replaced Kakha Imnadze, who has been in the position since 2013 and is now moving on to be the Georgian Ambassador to Canada. Imnadze wished Bakradze well as he takes over the position.

Besides serving as the Georgian Ambassador to the U.S., Bakradze was also a State Minister at the Office of the State Minister of Georgia on European and Euro-Atlantic Integration.

Prior to that, he was the Georgian Ambassador to Greece and the Charge d’Affaires for the Georgian Embassy in Finland. He has also been a Senior Counsellor at the Embassy of Georgia to Sweden and Finland.

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