Georgian NGOs ask EU commissioner to make interim report on candidacy public

Several Georgian NGOs on Thursday requested Olivér Várhelyi, the Commissioner for Neighbourhood and Enlargement, to make the European Commission’s interim report on Georgia’s meeting the conditions of the bloc’s candidacy public. 

The report is scheduled to be released in Spring, while the commission will issue its recommendations to the European Council whether to grant Georgia the bloc’s membership candidate status in October. 

 

The domestic organizations that include Open Society Foundation; Union Sapari; Democracy Research Institute (DRI), Governance Monitoring Center (GMC), Georgian Reforms Associates (GRASS), Young Lawyers Association of Georgia and others, said Georgia Georgia had a “strong civil society, which plays an extremely important role in the country’s European integration process”. 

The NGOs stressed they had been “actively engaged” in supervising the country’s authorities’ efforts to meet the 12 conditions outlined by the bloc in June 2022 to grant its membership candidate status to Georgia. 

“We request that the interim evaluation be public and accessible to the interested parties, including the civil society of the country. Publicity of the mid-term evaluation will ensure the transparency of the process, enable the active participation of civil society in it and significantly contribute to the implementation of effective supervision of the implementation of priorities”, said the NGOs.