Ruling party’s Kirtskhalia: ambassadors have been ‘clearly brought onto agent field’

Georgia’s parliamentary majority leader, Irakli Kirtskhalia, on Wednesday said ambassadors have been “very clearly brought onto the agent field in a formal, official capacity”, led by EU Ambassador Paweł Herczyński.

Speaking on Imedi Live about the EU Ambassador’s recent statement, Kirtskhalia said he was not referring to all diplomatic missions.

He criticised what he described as another “arrogant” and “destructive” statement by the EU Ambassador, saying that such rhetoric had unfortunately become familiar to Georgian society.

He added that together with being insulting, the statement also contained “clear tones of threat” and said it was offensive to Georgian society and statehood.

“It was insulting for our society, for our statehood and crossed every moral line. I am not even speaking about diplomatic ethics and the Vienna Convention, they are not even worth mentioning in this context,” Kirtskhalia said.

“They did not understand our country, they have a clear task and they are performing the function of amplifying that task,” he added.

Kirtskhalia also said that summoning the Ambassador to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was the correct step.

“Any self-respecting country will of course summon [the Ambassador] and of course demand an answer. This is a step that absolutely had to be taken, and it has been taken more than once by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs,” Kirtskhalia said.