PM Bidzina Ivanishvili laid out four points, which, he thinks, should be a focus of a dialogue between his Georgian Dream (GD) coalition and President Saakashvili’s UNM party.

In a written statement released in response to President Saakashvili’s offer to meet, PM Ivanishvili says that he has no intention to engage “in futile and lengthy negotiations” or to let anyone “buy time” with such talks. He says that parliamentary speaker Davit Usupashvili has never terminated dialogue with the UNM parliamentary minority group and, if needed, Usupashvili is ready to meet the President to discus pressing issues, first and foremost related to constitutional changes to limit presidential powers to sack government and appoint new one without Parliament’s approval. Ivanishvili says that he too will be ready to engage in talks depending on how the process develops.

In his four-point agenda, Ivanishvili prioritizes resolving row on GD-initiated constitutional changes on presidential powers as the issue, which will help to pave the way for resolving other issues as well.

In the second point, Ivanishvili offers “cross-faction agreement” within the Parliament on the priorities of the country’s foreign policy; in January GD offered UNM to work on a joint document on the country’s foreign policy, which was then followed by UNM’s proposal to make pro-Western foreign policy course constitutionally guaranteed.

In the third point, Ivanishvili offers to establish the state constitutional commission, which in cooperation with foreign and local experts will develop draft of broader constitutional changes, which may also include reflecting Georgian people’s “historic European choice” in the preamble of the constitution.

In the fourth point, Ivanishvili offers to create working groups “to promptly address all important issues and coordinate positions.”