NATO Week opened in Georgia
Friday, April 11
NATO Week was officially opened in the Hotel “Courtyard Marriot” on April 7. A solemn ceremony was dedicated to the last three phases of the North-Atlantic Alliance enlargement process. Minister of Defence of Georgia Irakli Alasania attended the opening ceremony. Following the ceremony an international conference was unveiled. State Minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration of Georgia Alex Petriashvili and NATO Assistant Secretary General for Public Diplomacy Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovic opened the conference titled as “The Way Towards NATO: Sharing the Experience of Central and Eastern European Countries.”
Irakli Alasania delivered a speech in the second panel of the conference -“Georgia On the Way to NATO Integration; Preparation for the Upcoming 2014 NATO Summit.” The Minister of Defence briefed the conference participants on the reforms recently implemented within the armed forces of Georgia. The Minister stressed the importance of Georgia`s involvement in international peacekeeping missions. He also outlined the significance of Georgia`s membership in NATO. As the Minister emphasized, Georgia expects that progress would be achieved for Georgia at the Summit - “everybody recognizes that Georgia is in the position to be offered new instruments of integration. Besides that multilateral military-diplomatic works are planned for the coming months, including June, in order to achieve the goals a large part of our society expects from the NATO Summit. What is more important, certain trends have been defined over which we will have a dialogue with our partner countries as well as with NATO representatives. I also want to mention that the final Defence Reforms Assessment Document is due to be published by June of the current year which should become one of the pillars for our advancement at the NATO Summit. It is natural that a military component is also very crucial.”
The high-ranking officials of NATO members nations, as well as the representatives of executive and legislative authorities of Georgia, the members of Diplomatic Corps accredited to Georgia, NGOs and media outlets took part in the conference.
NATO Week is led in Georgia under the organizational support of the Information Center on NATO and the European Union. Furthermore, informative-educational meetings are scheduled in Tbilisi and in the region too. NATO Week will be over on the 16th of April.
