PM Garibashvili and Armenian PM Pashinyan Chair Inter-Governmental Economic Cooperation Commission
By Khatia Bzhalava
Tuesday, December 21
Prime Minister of Georgia Irakli Garibashvili and his Armenian counterpart Nikol Pashinyan chaired the eleventh sitting of the Inter-Governmental Economic Cooperation Commission in Tbilisi yesterday. Before the meeting, Garibashvili hosted the Armenian PM at the Government Administration.
Garibashvili stressed the importance of peace and stability in the region, noting that Georgia has always been motivated to play a vital role in this process. He pledged that Georgia is always ready to contribute and participate in advancing regional peace and stability. In this regard, Garibashvili stressed that the Peaceful Neighborhood Initiative voiced by him at the General Assembly of the United Nations (UNGA) is aimed at the stimulation of stability in the region.
Garibashvili underlined that the relationship between Georgia and Armenia is at the highest level.
“It can be said with pride and pleasure that such a relationship between us has never existed before,” the PM stressed. Garibashvili also noted that he is interested in developing trade and economic relations with Armenia.
The PM of Armenia noted that Georgia and Armenia set an ambitious goal in 2019 of increasing the volume of bilateral trade turnover to $1 billion, however, this process was delayed due to the pandemic. According to Pashinyan, now that everyone is learning to live in pandemic conditions, it is time to achieve this goal.
As the Armenian PM noted, bilateral relations between the two countries have been led dynamically.
“Our current bilateral agenda covers many directions, while friendly relations between our two countries facilitate the maintained security and stability in our region,” he noted. Pashinyan also focused on trade and economic cooperation between Georgia and Armenia, which covers transport and energy, advanced technologies, tourism, and other areas.
According to him, one of the pre-conditions of economic development between the two countries is mutual trust, which is based on the historic friendship between Georgian and Armenian people.
He stressed that this year he met with the Georgian Prime Minister four times, noting that “such cooperation serves as a basis for defining a new level of our economic relationship to further advance the traditional level of our interaction.”
