A joint Georgian-Russian anti-terrorist center was supposed to be created, but Mikheil Saakashvili refused - what does the Kremlin not forgive the third president?

After many years of silence, Russia's first diplomat said for the first time what the Kremlin does not forgive Mikheil Saakashvili. According to Sergey Lavrov, Russia withdrew its military bases from Georgia on the condition that an anti-terrorist center should be opened in the country and a permanent base for 1000 Russian soldiers should be established in Georgia.

Lavrov says that he knows the then foreign minister Zurabishvili very well, praises the Georgian dream and criticizes Mikheil Saakashvili for letting the Russians clear the Vaziani and Akhalkalaki bases.

Lavrov claims that the West started the war in Ukraine, and now wants to involve Georgia in this war and open a second front.

"The West tried and is trying to create an anti-Russia alliance with Georgia, where the president is Salome Zurabishvili, who is well known to me, who was the minister of foreign affairs in 2004-05 and signed an agreement with Georgia on the withdrawal of the two remaining Russian bases. At that time, the agreement provided for the establishment of a joint Georgia-Russia anti-terrorist center to be created, but when we fulfilled all our obligations, then Mikheil Saakashvili refused to create this center and practically lied to us. And now in Georgia, in addition to the president, who, thank God, does not determine the ways of the country's development, there is also a government that does not agree to the attempts of the West to join the sanctions to open a second front against Russia and says that he is leading only in the interests of the state of Georgia.

They have trade with Russia, tourism, as well as energy trains that they get from there. We want this region to have a constructive policy and not to return to the aggressive policy of Saakashvili's time. For this, we now want to launch a 3+3 format, which includes the three South Caucasus countries, as well as Turkey, Iran and Russia. The first contact was made and we will continue to work in this direction," says Lavrov.