Within the framework of “Georgian Defence Conference” (GDC) Georgian Minister of Defence Bacho Akhalaia has already held meetings with the US Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defence, Doctor Celeste Wallander and Director General of International Military Staff of NATO, Lieutenant General Jurgen Bornemann. The topics of discussion at the meeting were global security and bilateral cooperation issues, NATO-Georgian relationship, ongoing ISAF operation in Afghanistan and the reforms being implemented in the Georgian Defence system.

“I’m very grateful to the Georgian government for organizing a conference on defence issues. I’m very lucky to be here and privileged to have been invited and to be the part of the event. We had a good discussion this morning; and I’ve had an opportunity to talk with the Minister about our defence cooperation. We discussed bilateral defence cooperation relationship, we discussed Georgia’s contribution to ISAF, to the NATO led effort in Afghanistan and we talked a little bit about security issues more generally,” Doctor Wallender stated.

NATO top Official, Lieutenant General Jurgen Bornemann has also underlined importance of the Defence Conference - “let me start by saying that it’s a great pleasure and an honor for me as the Director General of the International Military Staff, NATO HQ in Brussels, to take part in this very important Defence Conference of Georgia. It is important because we see here the results of the ongoing defence review Georgia is undertaking like many other partners and countries in NATO. . . We are making extensive reviews with your delegation in Brussels in the NATO Georgia Commission which we would like to continue and we are now intervening the very important steps in military. I just had a meeting with your Defence Minister where we went to those instruments and we came to the conclusion we are on the right track,” said General Bornemman in his interview with the media representatives.

“Representatives of partner nations such as the United States, as well as other NATO member countries attending the conference unilaterally support the course of development and reforming of our armed forces and consider that the reforms were being executed successfully. We hope that, through our close cooperation, we would be able to reinforce and intensively proceed with the process of implementing reforms in Georgian Armed Forces", declared Minister of Defence of Georgia Mr. Bacho Akhalaia.

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