TBILISI, May 10 Cancellation of the visa regime for citizens of Georgia from Russia is unacceptable, this is another Russian provocation, Georgian President Salome Zurabishvili said on Wednesday.
According to the decree of President Vladimir Putin published on Wednesday, Russia will cancel the visa regime with Georgia from May 15. Another decree lifts the ban for Russian airlines on flights to the country and the sale of tours.
«Another Russian provocation! The restoration of direct flights to Georgia and the abolition of the visa regime are unacceptable as long as Russia continues its aggression against Ukraine and occupies our territory!» — the president wrote on Twitter.
Georgia unilaterally introduced a visa-free regime for Russians in 2012.
Georgian-Russian relations escalated after the visit of Russian deputies who took part in at the international conference of Orthodoxy. Protests swept the capital of Georgia in June 2019. Against this background, by decree of the President of Russia, from July 8, 2019, airlines were temporarily banned from flying to Georgia, and tour operators and agents were advised not to sell tickets to this country. On the same date, the decision of the Russian Ministry of Transport to suspend flights of Georgian airlines to Russia came into force.
Russia launched a military operation in Ukraine on February 24 last year. President Vladimir Putin called its goal «the protection of people who have been subjected to bullying and genocide by the Kyiv regime for eight years.» For this, according to him, it is planned to carry out «demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine», to bring to justice all war criminals responsible for «bloody crimes against civilians» in Donbass.