Georgia has received an invitation to take part in partnership events at the upcoming NATO summit in Washington. This was announced by US Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs James O'Brien at a briefing for foreign journalists.
"They are invited to partner events. All NATO partners are invited to the summits for partners," the diplomat noted.
He added that U.S. authorities are "very concerned about the decisions and rhetoric coming from a very small number of leaders" of the ruling "Georgian Dream-Democratic Georgia" party. The invitation came despite the passage of Georgia's "foreign agents" law earlier this month.
At the press conference, O'Brien denounced the law proposed by the Georgian Dream party, which some opponents call a "Russian law," as well as Tbilisi's shift away from NATO.
The law requires nongovernmental organizations and media groups that receive at least 20 percent of their funding from abroad to register as organizations "pursuing the interests of a foreign power."
At the same time, O'Brien said that "the Georgian people want the country's integration into the EU and NATO."
"We want them to realize that the path they are taking and the rhetoric they are using towards the West is incompatible with what 80 percent of Georgian citizens want," O'Brien said. - We're trying to make it as clear as we can that there is an opportunity to move away from the path they have chosen.
O'Brien said all NATO partner nations have been invited to attend the NATO summit in Washington July 9-11, and the key themes of the summit are "the health of the alliance, the Indo-Pacific partnership and the success of Ukraine."
