Participants of the informal meeting, September 16, 2017. Photo: parliament.ge

Six senior MPs from Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine released a joint Communiqué on September 16, calling on the European Union to open the EU membership perspective for the three countries at the upcoming Eastern Partnership Summit in Brussels on November 24, 2017. 

The Communiqué, signed by MP Tamar Khulordava, chair of the Georgian Parliament’s European Integration Committee, along with three Ukrainian and two Moldovan parliamentarians, was elaborated within the framework of the Inter-parliamentary Cooperation Platform among EU Association Agreement Countries, at an informal meeting in Como, Italy.

According to the document, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine, “as the European states in pursuit of their European aspirations of full political, economic and institutional integration in the European Union,” recognize “the strategic importance of the European future as the fundamental choice for the sovereignty, prosperity and democratic statecraft in Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine.”

The Communiqué lays out the three countries’ expectations for the upcoming Eastern Partnership Summit, including opening of the EU membership perspective, introduction of a new European Investment Plan, supporting their participation in EU Agencies and Community Programs etc.

The MPs also agreed to address the European Parliament for its resolution “requesting the clear political support and practical roadmap for the membership,” and the Presidential troika of the Conference of Parliamentary Committees for Union Affairs of Parliaments of the European Union (COSAC) “to consider the possibility of granting to Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine the status of Associated Partners in COSAC.”

The meeting of the Inter-Parliamentary Cooperation Platform was hosted by the Konrad- Adenauer-Stiftung South Caucasus in joint cooperation with the Parliament of Georgia and the Economic Policy Research Centre, Tbilisi-based policy think tank. Numerous officials and experts from European countries, the United States and the Eastern Partnership countries attended the working sessions in Como focusing on the future of the Eastern Partnership and transatlantic cooperation.