Georgian Defense Ministry abolished obligatory military service

Photo: Wikipedia

Obligatory military service is abolished by Georgian Defense Ministry. The relevant document was signed by Minister of Defense Tina Khidasheli on 27^th of June.

According to her if the future minister decides to reestablish the obligatory military service, he/she will have to abolish yesterday’s decision.

Minister also stated during the meeting with media, that she promised to do everything for the obligatory military service to be abolished by the end of 2017.

“We tried to solve this problem via legislative moves, but they proved to be ineffective. That is why we have found another way of doing it and that is taking the decision unilaterally and personally by the Minister”, – Khidasheli said.

But the President of Georgia, Giorgi Margvelashvili believes that the Defense Minister should not have made a decision on the abolition of compulsory military service unilaterally.

As the President said, military call-up has not been canceled, “I agree with the Prime Minister, who said that such decisions, no matter how correct they are, should not be taken by one official singlehandedly, but should be considered in the Security Council and governmental meetings.

I do not assess the correctness of the decision; I’m just saying that this type of decisions must be made after extensive consultations,” – the President said and added he was not aware of the Defense Minister’s decision.

It should be noted that apart from the Ministry of Defense, several other institutions carry out calling up to the military service. The decision made by Khidasheli does not apply to them.

Reporter: Tamta JIJAVADZE – Georgia