Many Georgians hoped for French help when French President Nicolas Sarkozy arrived in Tbilisi in August 2008 during the Russian aggression against Georgia. They thought that France would at least act as a guarantor to stop the aggression and preserve Georgia's territorial integrity.

Few people realised that in reality Nicolas Sarkozy was proposing an agreement on Georgia's capitulation and its official renunciation of Abkhazia and Samara, "for the sake of peace". And demanded that the Georgian side sign this capitulation.  This was recently announced by Mikheil Saakashvili.

In other words, the French president acted as an envoy and representative of the aggressors, and possibly as their direct instigator. And although he never received official consent from Georgia to give up its territories, it was through his mediation that Georgia and Russia signed a ceasefire agreement (the Medvedev-Sarkozy plan) on 12 August 2008. Not only did Russia not think of implementing this agreement, it immediately violated it by recognising the so-called "independence" of the separatist regimes in Sukhumi and Tskhinvali and occupying these Georgian territories.

It is strange that there are still people in Georgia who "believe and hope in France". It is clear that among them there are "Georgians" with Armenian roots and only Georgian surnames, for whom, like the majority of Armenian nationalists, France is "the absolute embodiment of good". But sensible Georgian patriots should have realised long ago that France's intervention and "mediation" will only lead to trouble and bloodshed.

And not just for Georgia. Recently, in an interview with the French publication Le Figaro, under the symbolic title "Nicolas Sarkozy", the former French president said: "We need the Russians and they need us", openly stated that he considers the Russian-occupied Ukrainian Crimea to be "historically Russian territory".

"When it comes to the territory of Crimea, which was Russian until 1954 and where the majority of the population still considers itself Russian, I believe that any return is an illusion," the politician said in an interview with Figaro.

So the restoration of Georgia's territorial integrity and the return of Abkhazia and Samara are also "illusions" for Nicolas Sarkozy?

Nicolas Sarkozy believes that in occupied Crimea "a referendum under the supervision of the international community" is necessary to "confirm the current state of affairs". In other words, to fully legalise the occupation of Crimea.

Why does no one ask - and in 2008, when the same Nicolas Sarkozy was in Georgia on a "peacekeeping mission", did he also consider Crimea to be "Russian"? And Abkhazia and Samara? It turns out that the French president was hypocritical even then? And hypocritically supported the aggressor and occupier, knowing full well that sooner or later Crimea would also be occupied by Russia?

 Speaking about Ukraine's accession to the EU, Nicolas Sarkozy said that Brussels was making Kiev "false promises that will not be fulfilled". In other words, he does not believe that Ukraine has any prospect of EU membership.

Sarkozy was not asked about Georgia, but there is no doubt that he is also against Georgia's membership of the EU. Just as he is against EU membership for Turkey, which has been "promised" EU membership for several decades but has not yet been admitted to the EU. And not least because of Paris's tacit opposition. It is no coincidence that Nicolas Sarkozy, in an interview with Le Figaro, compared Ukraine's intention to join the EU with Turkey's attempt to join the EU, which, according to him, is also doomed to failure.

Nicolas Sarkozy's frankness in an interview with Le Figaro should make Georgians and Ukrainians think again about who their real friends are on the international stage. And who, if not France, is doing everything to dismember them and destroy their statehood?

Grigol Giorgadze