On September 9, the Chairman of the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress (EAJC) General Council Josef Zisels and General Council members Elena Berkovich and Guram Batiashvili met with Georgia Minister of Foreign Affairs Grigol Vashadze.

The neogtiations touched upon problems of the Near East peace process, in particular, the situation in connection with the possible unilateral proclamation of a Palestinian state at the nearest session of the UN General Assembly. Josef Zisels gave a detailed explanation of the EAJC position on this topic, stressing that the Congress is interested in peace first and foremost and believes that the actions of all interested sites should be motivated by a feeling of responsibility for the further developments in the Near East.

Grigol Vashadze assured the EAJC delegation that Georgia's external policy for the Near East is stable, and that the development of relationships with the Arabic countries will most certainly not be at the cost of Georgia's relationship with Israel. The Minister also told the EAJC delegation that Georgia will not dissapoint its friends and partners at the UN General Assembly.

The next topic of disussion was Georgia's position on the possible participation of its delegation at the Durban-3 conference, which is scheduled to take place on September 21. Josef Zisels expressed the Congress' view on this conference as a world-famous anti-Israeli and anti-Semitic event. Ukrainian readers will certainly remember that the Interregional Academy Personnel Management (MAUP) many-yeared rabid anti-Semitism campaign, headed by its leader Georgiy Schokin, began with Schokin's xenophobic speech at the first Durban conference in 2001. It is notable that after a similar meeting between Josef Zisels and Grigol Vashadze in the spring of 2009, Georgia elected not to send a delegation to the Durban-2 conference.
At Josef Zisels' initiative, the two sides also negotiated cooperation in exchanging materials on the criems of totalitarian regimes, as a museum of Soviet occupation has been functioning in Tbilisi for many years now, and it has accumulated an impressive archives of documents on the subject.