PM Bidzina Ivanishvili met on Saturday met lawmakers from his Georgian Dream parliamentary majority group to discuss upcoming presidential elections.

“Apart of concrete issues related to elections, I requested the parliamentary majority to maximally refrain from rude remarks in address of the opposition. We should manage to defuse highly charged [political situation], which looks like a fistfight between the [GD parliamentary] majority and [UNM parliamentary] minority groups,” Ivanishvili said after the meeting.

“There have been complaints from the parliamentary majority members, but I asked them that as far as they represent the parliamentary majority, they should make the first step and manage to defuse [tensions],” he said. “We should direct our energy not towards wrangling between each other, but towards making good deeds for the country.”

“I also requested them to be maximally correct in respect of the judiciary,” said Ivanishvili, who met Chairman of Supreme Court, Kote Kublashvili, a day earlier in Batumi and pledged once again to secure independence of the judiciary.

On upcoming presidential elections, PM Ivanishvili said after meeting with GD lawmakers that the authorities would create “equal conditions” for all the candidates.

“We should create a precedent wherein no state resources will be used for a presidential candidate,” Ivanishvili said.

“The campaign should be without any aggression and the lawmakers have also expressed opinion that the campaign should be focused on positive [issues] rather than on mudslinging,” he added.

GD’s presidential candidate Giorgi Margvelashvili, who is now education minister and the first deputy prime minister, was also present at the meeting along with some other government members.

Margvelashvili has said previously for number of times that although the law does not obligate him to quit his post while campaigning for the presidency, he will resign.

Margvelashvili said on July 12 that new education minister, who will replace him, was already selected and will be named on July 15. Some media sources speculate that first deputy education minister, Tamar Sanikidze, is likely to replace Margvelashvili on minister’s post.