Georgian Parliament Speaker: Estonia asked Georgia to escalate with Russia, now demands security guarantees for its own NATO forces

Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili on Wednesday criticised Estonia, accusing its officials of double standards after Estonia requested security guarantees for its peacekeeping troops.

Papuashvili’s remarks came after Estonia’s Foreign Minister, Margus Tsahkna stated that Estonia would consider sending troops to Ukraine only if security guarantees extended to peacekeeping forces as well.

In a social media post, Papuashvili argued that while Estonian officials previously urged Georgia to take a harsher stance against Russia without offering any security assurances, they were now seeking such guarantees for their own military personnel - who were already part of NATO’s defence framework.

“These people were demanding escalation with Russia from us without giving us any guarantees, and now they are asking for security guarantees for their own army (!), which at the same time is a NATO army (!)”, he said.

The Speaker also highlighted the unequal contributions to past NATO missions, pointing out that Georgia deployed significantly more troops to Afghanistan than Estonia.

“During NATO’s mission in Afghanistan, Estonia’s largest troop contingent was 150, while ours was 1,560 soldiers”, he concluded.