“It is painful for me to realize that the radicals of Saakashvili's school have managed to direct the 20-21 June protests against Russia. As a result, everything positive in the Georgian-Russian relations, which we have jointly created since 2012, is in danger. The new atmosphere had already been working for the benefit of our peoples and had started to bring results," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin said in an interview with Kommersant.

According to Karasin, the high-ranking politicians of Georgia made rough and irresponsible statements and the radicals associated with the United National Movement led the situation to the deadlock of confrontation and hostility.

"I am convinced that Tbilisi has already realized this," Karasin said.

According to him, Georgia seems to have forgotten that Russia has its own views about honesty and dignity.

“It is not in our traditions to “swallow” rudeness and threats against our people. We have to identify and neutralize risks in advance. I hope our adequate reaction was a lesson for those who want to cynically earn points in the political game at the expense of the anti-Russian rhetoric and threats. We will fight for active relations with Georgia. Our peoples have enough common sense to support constructive approaches," Grigory Karasin said.

Russian and Georgian officials can discuss bilateral relations in the South Caucasus during the Geneva meetings, which will be held on July 2-3, - Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin said.

"The Geneva meetings on security in the South Caucasus are dedicated only to the relations between Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The bilateral relations between Russia and Georgia will not be discussed there. But since Georgia's representatives will be there, we will definitely give talk about this issue as well, "Grigory Karasin said in an interview with the Kommersant newspaper.

We were ready to abolish visa regime but it failed, now we will have to wait for a better time, - Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Grigory Karasin said in an interview with the Kommersant newspaper.

Karasin also touched upon the abolition of restrictions imposed for Georgia, namely the preconditions of restoration of direct flights.

"We are waiting for the normalization of situation in Georgia, we want to see that the anti-Russian campaign is over and our citizens are not at risk," the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister said.

source: IPN/ interpressnews.ge