Brussels, May 15, 2013 – Today, at the Residence Palace in Brussels, TI Georgia is taking part in a Policy Dialogue, Political reforms in Georgia: challenges and perspectives in the transition period, in the run up to the EU Eastern Partnership summit at Vilnius in November. The November summit could see Georgia enter an initial EU Association Agreement and a Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement. Today, as well as discussing current negotiations between the EU and Georgia, there is a need to pause and take stock of the democracy and governance related reforms that are happening in Georgia. These and other issues will be discussed during today’s event, where along with Georgian and European politicians, two NGOs, Transparency International Georgia and the International Society for Fair Elections and Democracy (ISFED) have been invited to speak.

Eka Gigauri, TI Georgia’s Executive Director, and Nino Lomjaria, ISFED’s Executive Director, will be speaking about the challenges that face Georgia’s new government during this transition period and will discuss a range of issues including transitional and restorative justice, the impact of the elections on the public sector, surveillance and privacy violations, the media environment in the post-election period, as well as providing an opinion on significant current reforms.  

This Policy Dialogue event is organized by the European Policy Centre, an independent Brussels-based think tank, in cooperation with Transparency International’s EU Liaison Office. It is important that two Georgian MPs are participating in the event: Viktor Dolidze, from the Parliamentary majority party and Giorgi Kandelaki, a minority party representative. Other speakers at the Policy Dialogue include: Reinhold Brender, Eastern Partnership – bilateral, European External Action Service, Graham Watson, Member of the European Parliament and Amanda Paul, European Policy Centre Policy Analyst.