georgian path to eu visa liberalization: georgian fatigue and european caution

8/15/2019 Georgian Path to EU Visa Liberalization: Georgian fatigue and European caution

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OPINION PAPER

INTRODUCTION

Recent talks on the visa liberalization of the European Union for thecitizens of Georgia made a lot of people wonder if this process could behampered by the two highest branches of the European Union, EuropeanParliament and European Council. As much as Georgians love to travel toEU member states (freely) some bureaucratic or as people in the EU call iteurocratic procedures must be taken in order to make Georgian dream ofvisa free movement to EU come true.

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Last Wednesday EU envoys in Brussels failed to make a decision onissuing visa waiver to citizens of Georgia holding biometric passports. Oneunnamed diplomat who opposed the deal said, “We don’t want to stop thewhole process. We just want to be more cautious.”

His words are presumably continuation of a 2decision of European Coun-cil which aims to make it easier for EU to suspend visa-free travel in case ofemergency. This perpetuation and addition of technical processes annoyedmany not only in Georgia but in other countries holding an Action Plan onVisa Liberalization (VLAP) including Ukraine, Turkey and Kosovo.

*Ioseb ‘Joseph’ Jorjoliani is a member of GIP Young Experts Network and aBA student of International Relations at Washington and Jefferson College, USA.

IOSEB ‘JOSEPH’ JORJOLIANI

GIP opinion paper/June 2016

GEORGIAN PATH TO EU VISA

LIBERALIZATION:GEORGIAN FATIGUE AND EUROPEAN CAUTION


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VLAP was granted to Georgia in 2013 and since then Georgian government haspushed packages of reforms that led to the nal report of European Commission inDecember 2015. Only step that is left for visa liberalization for Georgia is conrma-tion from European Parliament and European Council.

European diplomats have doubts on other VLAP countries, Ukraine, Turkey andKosovo. With regards to Turkey, a key puzzle is Turkey’s immigration policy andrefusal to change its anti-terrorist laws. 3Both European and Turkish sides realizethat visa waiver is not done deal in case of Turkey.

Ukraine has a large population of some 45 million and is in a constant state ofwar, thus illegal immigration and safety in the country might be the main obstacles.One European expert on Eastern Partnership countries told me in a private conver-

sation, “if the issue of Georgia and Ukraine is discussed in the same framework you[Georgia] are unlikely to get visa waiver but if Georgia gets a separate spot on a dis-cussion table, you will denitely be satised with the decision.” His words derivefrom Ukraine’s failure to tackle corruption and unstable political environment thathas no place in Georgia.

4Kosovo has many asylum seekers in the EU member states. Moreover 5 mem-bers of the EU, Slovakia, Greece, Romania, Cyprus and Spain do not even recognizeKosovo as an independent state and it is a legal dilemma what would happen ifKosovo citizen appears on the soil of aforementioned states. For that and some oth-er factors Kosovo issue might be delayed.

Georgia will hopefully get a separate spot from Ukraine on a discussion table, Iwould say unlike other candidate countries EU has no substantial reason to delaya visa waiver to Georgia other than some eurocratic procedures, as Georgia is theonly country which most eurocrats agree had fullled its obligations in terms of anAction Plan on Visa Liberalization (VLAP). However, there are some factors thatmight hamper Georgia’s path to visa liberalization.


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RUSSIA FACTOR

All but Russia’s role must not be forgottenwhen talking about Georgia’s western aspira-tions. Although two regions of Georgia are still

occupied by Russian backed separatists andprotected by Russian military forces, Georgianside managed to soften the former govern-ment’s antagonistic approach towards theseconicts without reestablishing diplomatic tieswith Kremlin. However, we have to bear inmind that Russia still seeks to spread its pro-paganda machine all over Georgia due to lat-er’s euro-atlantic aspirations. Some even relaterecent attack on vegan cafe “Kiwi” in Tbilisi by

Georgian ultra nationalist group5

, to Russia, asnationalist groups in Georgia are mostly nan-cially supported by Kremlin. The incidents likeone in Kiwi cafe and another one at a 6rockconcert in Tbilisi damage Georgia’s prestigeglobally and creates a wrong image of Georgia(basically what Russian propaganda aims for).Russian sentiments could also be found inseveral European publications that exacerbateGeorgians’ criminal records in Europe, mostlyin Germany. It is true that many members ofRussian maa also known as “thieves in law”that operates not only in Europe but globally,are Georgians. However, there are not many orany “thieves in law” on Georgian soil.7 “Thereis only one place for thieves in law in Georgiaand that place is jail,” said Georgia’s interiorminister, Giorgi Mghebrishvili in his interviewwith a German publication “Das Erste”.

It is an assumption worth mentioning

that Russian propaganda (which gained mo-mentum in Europe as well) has something todo with relating Russian maa activities toGeorgians, thus damaging Georgia’s prestigeamong European nations.

GERMAN CONCERN

Of course, there are cases which provethat Georgians are not angels, meaning that

small crimes committed by Georgian nation-als have been problem in Germany in recentyears. Georgia ranks 25th in the list of crimes

committed by foreign nationals in Germany.That is why in a recent discussion in GermanBundestag, representatives from governing co-alition - Christian Democratic (CDU) and So-cialist (SPD) parties - expressed their concernsover Georgian organized crime in Germany.8However, German interior minister, Thomasde Maizière did not directly respond to Par-liamentarians’ concerns. The concerns shouldsurely be taken into consideration but Geor-gia’s effort to tackle organized crime shouldnot be neglected. Recently, Georgian ofcialspassed the list of around 400 Georgian crimi-nals to Interpol in an effort to ght organizedcrime. 9Moreover, Georgia has highest safety

index of all European nations in a poll by awebsite Numbeo.

If we look back to 2009, when EU openedits borders to the Republic of Serbia, Serbiancrime rate was one of the highest in Germany.In a nutshell, this argument of Georgian crimerate in Germany cannot be a key determinantin the process of visa liberalization.

10Another concern that Bundestag MPs ex-

pressed was Immigration from VLAP coun-tries. SPD member Peer Steinbrück said thatall negotiations with VLAP countries must beput on hold until the migration crisis in Eu-rope is resolved. Hopefully, German elites donot share his views as Georgia does not havemany asylum seekers. If that was the case, asimple step would be to remove Georgia fromthe list of asylum seeking nations, a move that11Austria pulled in the beginning of 2016.

UPCOMING REFERENDUM IN UNIT-ED KINGDOM

This is just a personal assumption that many ofmy colleagues do not share but I believe UK’sreferendum does have something to do withEU’s hampering visa liberalization process.As Brits are deciding to vote either to stay orleave European Union on June 23rd, enlarge-

ment of EU’s sphere might not be a step thatwill get a positive feedback from UK citizensand might inspire them to vote leave instead of


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stay. Moreover, the key concern of why UK isleaving EU is related immigration policy. Al-though UK is not a member of Schengen Area(where VLAP countries seek to get visa waiv-

ers), EU’s decision to grant visa free entranceto 140 million new citizens of Turkey, Ukraine,Georgia and Kosovo, will likely bring more EUskepticism to the front. Again, this is just anassumption I thought was worth sharing.

BIOMETRIC PASSPORTS

The issue of biometric passports is mostly un-derrated when talking about visa liberaliza-tion. In fact, no citizen can enter the Schengenzone without such passports. It is rather ad-vantage for Georgia as it is a leading countryin terms of biometric passport issuance amongVLAP countries. (It is a document that con-tains biometric information that can be used tosignicantly enhance the reliability of personaldocuments) Ukraine only started issuing suchpassports in late 2012 and many citizens of ithave yet to apply for biometric passports. In

fact, only 2 million citizens of all VLAP coun-tries have obtained biometric passports ac-cording to Brussels data. Moreover, Turkeyhas not even started issuing such documents.This might turn around many visa waiversceptics as the procedure of getting a biometricpassport will take time thus not many citizenswould be allowed into the EU. After all obtain-ing biometric passports is not as easy for othernationals as it is for Georgians.

CONCLUSION

In face of the biggest migration crisis in Europe,it is indeed clear that most eurocrats refrainfrom discussing issues such as visa waivers forVLAP countries. More and more refugees seekan asylum in the European Union and it mightbe risky to waive visas for neighboring states.The next discussions for visa liberalization willmost likely take place next week in Brussels orin the rst week of July. If the visa free access isnot granted to Georgia by then, we would ex-pect it in the mid-September as most Europeaninstitutions do not hold meetings in August.However, Georgians also need to be under-

standing challenges that EU faces now. I be-lieve granting visa free access to Georgian cit-izens will eventually take place, whether soonor late depends on eurocrats and not on Geor-gian side any more. Considering the fact thatthe majority of Georgian population is drivenby the forces of reaction and tradition, europe-ans should not be surprised if the population isdisappointed after their decision to delay Visafree access as Kremlin is constantly trying to

destabilize situation and is using informationwarfare (propaganda) as its primary tool. Well,I do not believe in it but in the worst case sce-nario all of these might backlash and pro Rus-sian sentiment might arise among Georgians.However, I have great faith in Georgian peopleand believe that the only thing Georgia needsto do is to maintain an active communicationwith the EU as the path of Georgia’s European-ization is irreversible and cannot be challengedby even the powers like Russia.


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REFERENCES:

1Reuters, “Europe puts brake on visa liberalization for now amid immigration fears”, 1June 2016. http://www.reuters.com/article/us-europe-migrants-eu-visas-idUSKCN0YN56F

2Russia Today, “German govt unsure about visa-free regime for Georgia & Ukraine,fearing spike in crime rate”, 5 June 2016. https://www.rt.com/news/345494-germany-vi-sa-georgia-ukraine/

3Deutsche Welle, “Berlin: Turkey visa liberalization ‘not a done deal”, 28 May 2016.http://www.dw.com/en/berlin-turkey-visa-liberalization-not-a-done-deal/a-19290070

4B92.Kosovo should expect “delays” in visa liberalization deal, 2 June 2016. http://www.b92.net/eng/news/politics.php?yyyy=2016&mm=06&dd=02&nav_id=98197

5Telegraph,”Sausage-wielding ultra-nationalists attack vegan cafe in Tbilisi”, 31 May2016. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/05/31/sausage-wielding-ultra-nationalists-at-tack-vegan-cafe-in-tbilisi/

6Georgia Today, “Radical Priests, Orthodox Christian Activists Shut Down Tbilisi RockFestival”,4 June 2016. http://georgiatoday.ge/news/3956/Radical-Priests,-Orthodox-Chris-tian-Activists-Shut-Down-Tbilisi-Rock-Festival

7Das Erste, “Georgien ist kein Mafia-Land”. 8 April 2016. https://www.tagesschau.de/ausland/georgien-109.html

8Die Welt, “Regierung fürchtet georgische Diebesbanden”, 5 June 2016. http://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article155960343/Regierung-fuerchtet-georgische-Diebesbanden.html

9Numbeo, “World Safety Index”, 5 June 2016. http://www.numbeo.com/crime/rank-ings_by_country.jsp

10Gatestone Institute,”Germany: Migrant Crime Skyrockets”, 21 February 2016. http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/7470/germany-migrants-crime

11Interpressnews, “Georgian citizens to be refused asylum in Austria”, 16 February 2016.http://www.interpressnews.ge/en/politicss/76073-georgian-citizens-to-be-refused-asylum-in-austria.html?ar=A

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Georgian Institute of Politics

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through policy research and advocacy in Georgia.

georgian path to eu visa liberalization: georgian fatigue and european caution

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