“On Georgia’s State Flag Day, we saw an indecent ‘congratulation’ from the EU Embassy to the Georgian people, featuring footage that insults the Georgian flag. Of course, this indecency is absolutely unacceptable,” Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili said, commenting on a video published by the EU Embassy in connection with State Flag Day.

As Papuashvili told journalists, this was a “shameful act by the EU Embassy,” and the embassy should take down the video.

“If the EU Embassy really wanted to congratulate us, perhaps the European Union should finally take an example from the new U.S. administration. They could at least have seen how the U.S. Embassy congratulated Georgia on State Flag Day yesterday. What we see in the political space - the value-based divergence between the EU and the new U.S. administration - we saw exactly the same thing at the level of the embassies. The contrast we saw yesterday clearly demonstrates the civilizational gap toward which Brussels bureaucracy is dragging things today.

We saw that this was an act of justifying and romanticizing violence, including support for it. On Georgia’s State Flag Day, we witnessed an indecent ‘congratulation’ from the EU Embassy to the Georgian people, featuring footage that insults the Georgian flag. Of course, this indecency is absolutely unacceptable. To use the words of the EU Ambassador himself, what we saw yesterday on the EU Embassy’s social media page was outrageous, shameful, and disgusting. This indecency must stop.

If I were in their place, I would remove this video altogether, because this indecency is an insult to the Georgian flag, to the Georgian people, and first and foremost to the very idea of Europe. Essentially, this was also a certain political message. How else should we understand it, except as showing where hatred and violence are inspired, financed, and directed from? This is what we saw yesterday in this shameful act by the EU Embassy. My advice would be that they remove from their page this indecent, flag-insulting, people-insulting, and violence-inciting ‘congratulation’ and video,” Papuashvili stated.

At the same time, he noted that “today’s Brussels bureaucracy and the current leadership of the European Union are detached from the interests of European peoples.”

“This is the main problem that gives rise to other major problems. Today, Brussels bureaucracy is acting according to an externally imposed agenda that absolutely does not correspond to the interests of European peoples. This is reflected, among other things, in relations with Georgia and in foreign policy in general, which is clearly unprofessional today. The results are visible for the EU as well, which is not a serious participant in negotiations and discussions, including those concerning the European continent. They themselves often note that ‘the European Union is more on the menu than sitting at the table.’ This figurative expression is now used by Europeans themselves when speaking about the European Union,” Papuashvili said.