Armenians do not have to seek Georgian citizenship to travel to EU – lawmaker

After the European Union’s move to unblock the visa-free travel for Georgia and Ukraine, concerns rose in Armenia over many citizens’ possible attempt to seek Georgian citizenship to facilitate their travel to the Schengen zone.

For comments on this and other issues, Tert.am has interviewed Shirak Torosyan, a Georgian-Armenian member of Armenia’s National Assembly (ruling Republican faction).

Mr Torosyan, Georgia and Ukraine have been given the privilege to travel to the Schengen zone without visas. Is this a likely cause of exodus for Armenian citizens in terms of obtaining the neighboring country’s citizenship and travelling to the countries in the Schengen zone?   

It may not pave way to emigration, and there are several reasons ruling out that possibility. Armenian citizens will have great difficulty obtaining Georgian citizenship as the procedure is rather complicated in the country; that’s a closed system. Even many Armenians who have Georgian-Armenian roots and wish to obtain Georgian citizenship encounter lots of obstacles.

So the procedures are complicated and almost impossible. [Citizens of] other countries too, have the opportunity to travel to the EU zone, yet that doesn’t imply that third country citizens can leave for the Schengen area by obtaining [Georgian] citizenship.  

What will be the benefits for Georgia if it grants’ citizenship to foreigners? Does it pose any hazards to the country?

The second reason is that Georgia is a multi-ethnic country, and it has problems with the ethnic minorities residing within its boundaries. Under the former government, the Soviet Georgian citizens who were born [in Georgia] but had to later change their citizenship, were said to be entitled to again obtain Georgian citizenship through simplified procedures. And the procedure applied to many then. Now, however, citizenship is granted only to those people who frequently visit Georgia. These may be, for instance, Armenian citizens who permanently reside in Georgia etc.  

What about the requirement on the part of EU?

Whenever the European Union revokes the visa regime with a country, those countries are assigned a specific task, which they normally resolve. Such tasks include also banning other countries’ citizens’ entry to the EU member states through obtaining citizenship. Hence Georgia practically imposed the complicated citizenship procedures after the agreement on lifting the visa regime a couple of years ago.

Stricter measures are unrelated to compliance with the EU accession requirements. So if Georgian citizens are granted visa-free travel to the Schengen zone, they are required to also impose stricter citizenship procedures.

Mr Torosyan, do you find the entry visa requirements facilitated for Armenian citizens?

I don’t think Armenian citizens face complicated problems in terms of traveling to Schengen countries. The process has been rather facilitated. For those with diplomatic passports, for example, [the visa requirements] have been absolutely lifted.  Our citizens can and do easily visit the Schengen zone, and there are absolutely no complaints in this connection. Well, in case of non-compliance with certain requirements, they are certainly rejected. But [Armenians] do not have to apply for another country’s citizenship [to travel to Eyrioe].

Summing up, the procedures for obtaining Georgian citizenship have been considerably toughened; secondly, granting citizenship is not in the Georgian state’s interests. Also, Georgia does not have an effective law on dual citizenship.