Cooperation with Russia not to affect Georgia's pro-Western policy - minister
TBILISI. July 10 (Interfax) - Improving the relations between Georgia and Russia will not hamper the rapprochement with the West, Georgian Finance Minister Ivane Machavariani said.
"All these talks that wine sold to Russia or a rise in the number of tourists from Russia sooner or later will make us give up our Western choice, this is blindness, to say the least, or subversive activity," Machavariani said on Georgia's Imedi TV channel.
Establishing relationships does not mean that Georgia's claims for the territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia will become softer and does not mean that Russia will refuse the recognition of the independence of these territories, he said.
"There are many examples in the world when trade, transport communications and cultural relations are continuing between those countries, which, to put it mildly, have quite complicated political relations," the minister said.