President of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili

I would like to welcome the President of Latvia, Vaira Vike-Freiberga.

We have been receiving lots of guests in Georgia these days and we are very happy about that.

Georgia has become an interesting and attractive country for our friends.

We remember Ms. Vaira Vike's visit to Georgia at the Independence Day.

This visit will result in number of interesting negotiations. The Latvian President is accompanied by a dozen of businessmen. Here is the first result - an agreement on the opening of a Tbilisi-Riga air flight has been signed. This is what the government should always be doing for its people.

Since our independence it will be the first Baltic state with whom we will have an air communication.

The foreign and economic ministers held very interesting consultations.

In August together with the Ukrainian president we signed "Borjomi declaration" which means that Ukraine, Georgia, Romania, Lithuania and Latvia will participate in the meeting in Kiev on December 2005.

Latvia is an important participant and a leader of the European integration processes in the whole region.

We hope we will manage to enforce "thee plus three" format, which means Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia - Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia.

We are ready to hold a summit in Tbilisi to support European integration and help these countries come closer to each other.

Such contacts are very important for the strengthening of democracy in the region and for conflicts resolution.

We are going to continue intensive cooperation in the future.

President of Latvia Ms. Vaira Vike-Fraiberga

Thank you very much President Saakashvili. It was indeed a pleasure and honor to be here for your celebration of your independence. Latvia followed with great sympathy and understanding the strivings of your own people take their own destinies into their own hands and to go through the reforms that the nation understands are necessary for it to become an important player in the modern world.

We have gone through similar experience in our past and we have understanding and sympathy and you will find in Latvia always an advocate and a friend for your wish to establish a free, democratic, open and prosperous society. These are precisely the goals that we have been following. We know how hard the road is and how great the efforts that have to be taken.

It is not a process that is finished in a day. In our case of accession to the European Union or NATO we are pursuing it and it will go on for some time we have many decades to catch up to.

But in the process we have gained experience but we are ready to share and we are ready to collaborate. Most of all, as now members of the EU we stand ready to be your advocates and to insist that on the agenda of the EU and start this program of collaboration with neighboring countries, immediately adjacent to the borders of the EU or also beyond. We stand ready to support Georgia as one of the countries that should be on the agenda that needs our attention and our support. We are also firm advocates of the principle of territorial integrity of sovereign nations and we hope that continued discussions and debates with the help of international institutions or of other countries if needed. But disputes of that sort are ultimately resettled and settled to the satisfaction of both sides, but they cannot remain for a long as constant and chronicle points of dispute. I think this is one of the priorities that most of the nations concern but the nations beyond should understand and should do their utmost to help them solve regional conflicts where they exist.

Most of all we wish the Georgian people well. We stand ready to work with you in all fields of collaboration. The delegation accompanying the President includes ministers. You have seen the agreements we have signed. The businessmen who have come along look forward to collaborating with your business people.

We are opening a new page in histories of our nations. I myself, I am an optimist I think we have exciting possibilities for development and there will be all more exciting and productive if we can find areas of complimentarily and of mutual support.

Communications Office
of the President of Georgia