"Democracy has won with democratic methods," she summed up the situation.
Updated Georgia is recurring to peaceful democratic means to settle its problems. The rulers of Abkhazia and South Ossetia-self-proclaimed republics in Georgia - may find that of major interest, she assumes.
Georgia is willing to re-appraise the Abkhaz situation with settlement prospects, added the minister.
"Georgia's new leaders are self-reliant. That does not mean that they are aggressive. We are taking a more pragmatic view of things than before," she reassured.
Miss Zurabishvili thanked Georgia's partners in Europe and the USA for promoting Adzhar settlement: "They helped us to get a dialogue going. When the dialogue exhausted its opportunities, and the situation demanded democratic progress, our partners offered us support." A reporter asked her what was to become of Aslan Abashidze, recent Adzhar president. He will not be harassed and persecuted, reassured the minister. Same about his family. Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili has pledged it.
"Russia has shifted the burden on its own shoulders. Thank you," said Salome Zurabishvili.
"Georgia has not entitled us to chase him," Sergei Lavrov, Russia's Foreign Minister, retorted to that.
Reconciliation is the core of current Georgian policies. It concerns all-whether they cherish the memory of President Zurab Gamsakhurdia or side with ex-President Aslan Abashidze, stressed Salome Zurabishvili.
She highly appreciated Igor Ivanov's visit to Batumi, Adzhar capital, as extremely important and endowed with a symbolism. Igor Ivanov, preceding Foreign Minister, is now Russia's federal Security Council Secretary.
"The Adzhar situation would have been settled in whatever case-the people determined that it would be so. But Mr. Ivanov arrived in an important symbolical move. Russia was proffering us a helping hand at the last instant. Mutual confidence is being established, which is necessary for our relations to take the right road. Now, we no longer have any difficulties trying to understand each other." Lengthy local conflicts are spoking the wheels of Caucasian progress, the minister went on.
"What we refer to as 'frozen conflicts' are actually freezing our development-I mean Georgia, Abkhazia and the entire region. We must realise the point, and Georgia has realised it." The same pertains to Karabakh, over which another two Transcaucasian countries-Armenia and Azerbaijan-have been clashing for many years now.
The whole world is making progress. Whether the Caucasian nations are to join it depends on the settlement of those and similar conflicts.
The Commonwealth of Independent States is among Georgia's foreign political priorities.
"The CIS is prominent in Georgian policies, with an emphasis on Armenia, Ukraine and the post-Soviet Central Asia." Georgia greatly values its partnership with CIS countries, and will carry it on, reassured the minister.
Her country is determined to combine its partnership with NATO with Russo-Georgian cooperation. Georgia's road to Europe, and to partnership with NATO, does not rule out close neighbourly contacts with Russia-the two trends can go together.
"The time of a choice from among the principal players is past. There was a time when Georgia was gambling on antagonisms. It gained nothing," Salome Zurabishvili emphatically remarked.
