Not in the alliance

Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili said that the country's hopes of joining NATO are “almost dead,” the Wall Street Journal writes on July 20. “This is a tragedy. This means that the Russians fought for a just cause,” the newspaper quotes Saakashvili as saying.

As you know, the possibility of Georgia joining the alliance has been discussed several times recently, but NATO did not force the issue. So, in December last year, the alliance council did not provide the country with an action plan for membership. And this despite the fact that in the conflict between Georgia and Russia, NATO advocated unconditional respect for the territorial integrity of Georgia. Still, it was reported that the promise to "eventually" admit Georgia into the alliance remained in force, but former NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer stated that Georgia had significant work to do to achieve the standards required to join the organization.

Now Saakashvili says that joining the European Union and reunification with Abkhazia and South Ossetia in the near future are as unlikely as joining NATO, the newspaper writes.

However, the Georgian Foreign Ministry then stated that the Wall Street Journal had incorrectly interpreted the president’s words: in fact, Saakashvili said that “if Russia achieves through its actions to block Georgia’s entry into NATO, it will be a tragedy.” Saakashvili announced at an extraordinary session of parliament that the publication had already apologized to him.