Georgia to officially apply for EU membership on Thursday: Officials

ANKARA

Georgia will officially apply for EU membership on Thursday, officials said on Wednesday.

The announcement was made on Twitter by Shalva Papuashvili, head of the Georgian Parliament, and Nikoloz Samkharadze, chair of the Parliament’s Foreign Relations Committee.

Their tweets were also reposted on the official Twitter account of Georgian Dream, the country’s ruling party.

Georgia’s bid to join the European bloc comes amid Ukraine’s bid to fast-track its own membership application.

In the wake of Russia’s war on Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy signed a formal request to join the EU this week and reiterated his appeal to the EU in a video address to the nation on Wednesday morning.

The presidents of eight EU member states – Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovakia and Slovenia – recently released an open letter pushing the bloc to grant Ukraine the status of an EU candidate.