Georgia explains why it did not vote for Ukrainian resolution in PACE
The Georgian delegation did not take part in the adoption of the resolution of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), which recognizes the forced transfer of Ukrainian children to Russia as genocide, as it was unable to attend the vote.
That is according to the Novosti-Georgia portal, Ukrinform reports.
The delegation, which flew to Strasbourg on April 24, included the chairman of the ruling party of Georgia, Irakli Kobakhidze, Deputy Speaker Archil Talakvadze, MPs from the parliamentary majority Irakli Chikovani, Khatia Tsilosani, Givi Mikanadze, and Eka Sepashvili.
The Georgian Dream party stated that they had purchased return tickets in advance, and therefore could not attend the vote.
"The return tickets were bought several weeks in advance because we had a specific agenda... The fact that we are not joining something on purpose is speculation," said Givi Mikanadze, a member of the delegation.
At the same time, Beka Davituliani, a deputy of the ruling Georgian Dream party, did not rule out that "the resolution contained something else that they do not support."
"For example, one of the previous resolutions was not only about supporting Ukraine, but also about releasing Saakashvili. Then our delegation said it would support the resolution if this clause was removed. But it was not removed, and we could not support the resolution," he said.
Earlier, a member of the Ukrainian delegation to PACE, MP from the European Solidarity party, Oleksii Honcharenko, said that the Georgian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe did not cast a single vote for the resolution on the forced removal of Ukrainian children from the territories occupied by Russia.
As reported by Ukrinform, on April 27, the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe recognized the deportation and forced transfer of Ukrainian children to the territory of the Russian Federation as genocide and called on the ICC to consider criminal prosecution for this crime.
The document entitled "Deportations and forcible transfers of Ukrainian children and other civilians to Russian Federation or to Ukrainian territories temporarily occupied: create conditions for their safe return, stop these crimes and punish the perpetrators" was voted for by 87 deputies out of 89 present, one was against, and one abstained.