25 April 2007
Tony Blair met with Mikheil Saakashvili in Downing Street today.
The two leaders spoke about a wide range of issues including international security and the economic ties between Britain and Georgia.
Parts of this transcript may have been edited
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Prime Minister:
Good Afternoon everyone. Can I welcome very much the President of Georgia here and say how delighted we are to see him back here in Downing Street again, and to pay tribute to the work that he and his government have done over these past few years in terms of the modernisation of Georgia’s economy which has been an extraordinary success story. The reforms that have been put through have often been difficult, but they have obviously made an enormous and beneficial difference to the country. And to say that our bilateral relationship is strong, we want to make it stronger still. We work closely in respect of the partnerships both of the European Union and the relationship and partnership with NATO, and we also see Georgia in its relations with other countries in the region as an important way that we can gain too a better understanding of what is happening in what is an immensely important part of the world.
And I would also like to pay tribute as well to the work that Georgia is doing in Iraq, and I know there is an increase of forces commitment that has been made by Georgia to our common effort there and I would like to thank you for that, that has been extremely important. And the relationship that we have now is one that is very, very solidly based, we would like to see it develop further. I am sure in the years to come that it will. There are some good trading relations but they could be developed and even better still, and the political relationship, as I say, is a strong one.
So thank you very much for coming here today.
Mr Mikheil Saakashvili:
Thank you so much Mr Prime Minister, I am really delighted to be back here at Downing Street. Georgia has really changed dramatically over the last three years, we have become the world’s number one reformer, according to the World Bank, we are one of the least corrupt economies in the world according to all the international institutions, we have investment boom now with more than $2 billion of direct foreign investment expected this year, with the UK becoming the main investor in Georgia, and Georgia is becoming an important role model for reforms as well as an important hub for the east-west energy corridor, east-west trade, all kinds of movements of people and goods and bridges into Europe.
The UK has been a very important supporter of ours for our NATO bid, and I am very grateful for your strong support for the membership action plan in NATO. I am grateful for your continued support with the neighbourhood policy of the European Union and for your principled approach on a number of regional issues, as well as your visionary approach of what the European role and engagement in our part of the world should be. I think there have been dramatic changes and some of your policies Prime Minister has contributed to that change greatly and we feel it, we cannot always express it openly but I have to express it now and thank you personally for your engagement, support, unwavering protection of the main principles that unite all of us.
Question:
You are meeting on the day of President Yeltsin’s funeral and I just wondered, looking at Anglo-Georgian relations perhaps through the prism of Russia, your very large neighbour to the north, I wonder, and this question is to both of you, if you fear that Russia might be rolling back some of the freedoms and openness that were introduced under President Yeltsin? And Prime Minister I wonder if you would care to say a few words about the death of the footballer Alan Ball.
Prime Minister:
First of all in respect of Alan Ball, I was really very sad indeed to hear of his death. He was an outstanding footballer, a great part of the World Cup winning team and I am very sorry for his family.
In respect of Russian relations there, let me repeat again, I offer my condolences to the family of President Yeltsin and pay tribute to him, to his leadership and to what a remarkable man he was at a very crucial moment of Russian history. I think our view is that there are two types of relationships that you have with countries, one is based purely on interests and power, and the other is based also on values, and it is easy to have the right relationship when those values are held in common. And of course I want a good and strong relationship with Russia, that is necessary for the UK, it is necessary for the international community, but it is important that it is based on shared values and shared principles. And the reason why we have developed a close relationship with Georgia over the past few years is because in terms of economic and political development Georgia is making not just real progress, but is aligning itself with values we happen to believe in, it is a matter of belief this, not just a matter of power. So as I say, as I have expressed when we had the recent Summit of the European Council, I think it is important that in creating the right relationship with Russia, and we want to do that of course, they recognise and we recognise that shared values and shared principles are as important, and at a more profound level more important than simply shared interests.
Mr Mikheil Saakashvili:
Well just briefly I fully share what the Prime Minister had to say about Russia. We also expressed condolences to the Russian people and I have sent the Speaker of Parliament of Georgia to get to Moscow for the funeral. We always had some complex and difficulties with relations with Russia, including in the ’90s with regard to Russia’s participation in civil wars that were taking place basically with huge participation and important participation of Russia and it was a pretty negative one. However of course we believe that we need to have a stable, secure, confident Russia and we fully support it. What my advice would be is engage Russia constructively based on principles, but here this ‘P’ word is also very important. Sometimes people say let’s engage constructively, sometimes it is a code word for appeasement and an appeasement of bad instincts is not good, or the bad instincts of some people. I am talking about engaging based on principles and values, and that is exactly the policy that is going to work. Russians are important partners, they are very important for us and they are very important for the rest of Europe, but also Europe is very important for them. Russia is not North Korea, they want to be respected, they want to be engaged on a daily basis, they would like to be part of the European environment, some of them might not have come to this European Economic Forum here in London but they are actually coming to London to enjoy life, they will go to the Cote d’Azur, they want to be respected, they want to be part of the wider European space. And I think sometimes some Europeans are under-estimating the influence and leverage and interdependence that exists out there, and I think proper doses of that interdependence and influence based on values and principles is exactly the right recipe for good transformation in this pretty turbulent period of transition for Russia and we feel the heat, but I think everybody else is feeling the heat and we should all be very careful.
Question:
Prime Minister, Mr President, what can you say about the future relationship about Britain and Georgia, and special economic relations and new investment?
Mr Mikheil Saakashvili:
Well I mean the UK is one of the biggest investors in Georgia. The good thing about this is that in most of the cases we don’t know who the concrete investors are. People in our case don’t have to come to the government to get permission to invest or to do business, we have a free economy which means that anybody can come, anybody in the EU can invest and the fact that we have quadrupling for the last couple of years of direct foreign investment proves the fact that the less you intervene, the less you meddle, the less you scrutinise and kind of try to patronise the investments more of them will come and the more successful they will be. And I think that is exactly the case that Georgia has proven that you know a liberal economy, a small government, less regulation and more openness can work just anywhere, there are no people that are not able to adapt to this, it is just a matter of political will. And I think more and more are coming and we are expecting you know some major investment. A banker told me the last time when I was here in London there is an inexplicable buzz around the investment community here in London, there is disproportionately high interest for a relatively small country like Georgia in London right now and he was asking me how did we do it. I don’t know how we did it, I mean that is how it is and it is good news for me.
Prime Minister:
Yes I mean I totally agree with that. You know the interesting thing about today’s world and the way the international economy works is that governments don’t direct companies to go and invest, but governments can create the right climate in which business will come and invest because they think they are operating according to certain rules that are clear and they are able to develop their business in the way that they want. And actually the investment opportunities are enormous in Georgia and we are the biggest investor, but I think there is a massive amount more that we can do and in the end what will happen is not me saying to our companies go there, or even the President saying to those companies come to Georgia, it will be because of the changes and reforms that he has been making which allow those companies to come and invest because they are going to get a good return and they will be in a good business environment.
Question:
This is a question just for the Prime Minister. The issue of the EU Constitution has been bubbling away under the German Presidency. You have only got a short while left in office, where would you like to see this issue parked, where would you like to see this issue left by the time you go?
Prime Minister:
The most important thing for Europe is to resolve the issue about how it works more effectively in a practical way now it is 27 countries, not 15, and there will be even more countries in years to come, so it has got to change its rules. But a conventional rule-making treaty in my view is better than a constitutional treaty. And so I would like to see a situation where not merely the name of the constitutional treaty is put to one side, but the characteristics of a constitution are not there, so that you go back to a more conventional rule-making treaty where you are trying to make Europe work more effectively, but not altering the essential constitutional relationship between the member states and the European Union. Now I would like to see the key elements of that agreed in June because the German Presidency is a Presidency that is strong enough to get proper agreement here, we will have a new French President at that time and frankly it is important that Europe doesn’t then spend another 2 to 3 years arguing about constitutional issues but concentrates on jobs, the economy, making ourselves competitive, mass immigration, law and order, the environment, you know the big issues that affect our citizens and that I think is a better way to approach it.
Question:
You said about the support of Great Britain for Georgia to became a membership programme of NATO, so how will the UK support Georgia to become a member of NATO?
Prime Minister:
Well I think the partnership framework that Georgia has with NATO allows the proper evolution of Georgia and we have supported that partnership and we will work with Georgia over the coming period of time to make it evolve. And I think again the key thing here is for those members of NATO to see the cooperation between NATO and Georgia grow, and also for a country like ours who have got major strategic military interests, the fact that Georgia and ourselves are working very closely in what is a very troubled situation in Iraq at the moment is also important for that. So we will continue to work closely with Georgia on the issue of Georgia’s relationship with NATO and I think that certainly the partnership that Georgia has enjoyed with NATO has been very fruitful I think and hope for both of us.
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