If the Baltics were serious about Ukraine, they would march their troops to the Ukrainian front, for this, they never needed any permission, writes the Speaker of the Georgian Parliament on the social network.

“Ex-president Salome Zourabishvili’s last few days’ voyage to the former Soviet Baltic States sums up what is wrong with these countries’, and the European bureaucracy’s, attitude to Georgia, three nasty aspects of which stand out: rejection of national sovereignty, subversion of legitimate authority, and creation of a false parallel universe. All three are reminiscent of what the USSR used to do in foreign affairs.

First, we have heard many times that the Baltics “support Georgia’s sovereignty and territorial integrity”. However, as soon as these words meet the real world, they ring hollow. How do these countries support Georgian sovereignty if they ignore the will of the majority of Georgian people to elect their own government? How does recognizing an ex-president, whose term expired last December, as the ‘legitimate authority of Georgia’ square with the talk of ‘supporting Georgia’s sovereignty’? The essence of sovereignty does not change depending on who is recognizing or threatening it. For Georgians, it does not make much difference whether the Soviet Union or Lithuania undermines our independent right to form the government.

Second, rhetorically splitting the people from their government is another old and trusted method of the Soviet interference with the other country’s sovereign affairs. In the last few months, we have seen continuous efforts by high-ranking Baltic politicians to virtually, even if fruitlessly, separate Georgian government from the Georgian people. Ex-president Zourabishvili’s current voyage to all three Baltic States and her official reception is indicative of the use of the same old Soviet playbook, retrieved, dusted and put to use by the same Baltic politicians who, otherwise, condemn ostensibly anything Communist, Soviet, and Russian. Yet, they seem to have been mentally stuck in the same straitjacket they are so eager to abandon.

Third, creating a fake and chaotic virtual universe, in which Georgia is a brutal dictatorship under Russia’s control, completes the delusional policy that the Baltics pursue. This falsity has nothing to do with caring for democracy but has obvious geopolitical reasons. Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania tried desperately to increase their own security by trying to distract Russia elsewhere, and thus pushing Georgia towards open confrontation with Moscow after the invasion of Ukraine. By insisting that Georgia, a non-EU and non-NATO country, impose bilateral sanctions on Russia, they counted on further Georgian-Russian escalation and, in effect, sacrificed Georgia for their own interests. There is no other logical explanation for their policy, because Georgia would not survive an armed conflict with Russia without the NATO security umbrella.

If the Baltics were serious about Ukraine, they would march their troops to the Ukrainian front. For this, they never needed any permission.

It is time for the governments of the EU member states to sideline the Baltics’ tantrums, cut through this vicious circle, and bring Georgian-EU relations back on track”, - writes Shalva Papuashvili.