Georgia–NATO relations
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Georgia and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) enjoy cordial relations. Georgia is not currently a member of NATO, but has been promised by NATO to be admitted in the future.
Cooperation officially began in 1994 when Georgia joined the NATO-run Partnership for Peace.[1] Georgia has moved quickly following the Rose Revolution in 2003 to seek closer ties and eventual membership with NATO[2] (although the previous administration had also indicated that they desired NATO membership a year before the revolution took place[3]). Georgia's powerful northern neighbor, Russia, has opposed the closer ties, including those expressed at the 2008 Bucharest summit where NATO members promised that Georgia would eventually join the organization. In the 7 December 2011 statement of the North Atlantic Council Georgia was designated as an "aspirant country".[4]
Complications in the relationship between NATO and Georgia includes presence of Russian forces in Georgian territory as a result of multiple recent conflicts, like the 2008 South Ossetia war, over the territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which are home to large numbers of Russian nationals. A nonbinding referendum in 2008 resulted in 77% of voters supporting NATO accession.[5]
The current Georgia–NATO relations occurs in the framework of the Substantial NATO–Georgia Package (SNGP), a set of measures at the strategic, tactical and operational levels launched in 2014. The package includes a Defence Institution Building School, NATO–Georgia Joint Training and Evaluation Centre and Logistics Facility, the facilitation of multi-national and regional military drills, and other measures.[6]