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Georgia Revived Contacts in 1992
Shevardnadze's diplomatic contacts and personal relationships
with many of the world's leaders ended Georgia's international
isolation in 1992. In March Germany became the first Western
country to post an ambassador to Georgia; Shevardnadze's close
relations with German foreign minister Hans-Dietrich Genscher
were a key factor in that decision. Recognition by the United
States came in April 1992, and a United States embassy was opened
in June 1992. Georgia became the 179th member of the United
Nations in July 1992; it was the last of the former Soviet
republics to be admitted. By December 1992, six countries had
diplomatic missions in Tbilisi: China, Germany, Israel, Russia,
Turkey, and the United States. Seventeen other countries began
conducting diplomatic affairs with Georgia through their
ambassadors to Russia or Ukraine. In August 1993, the United
States granted Georgia most-favored-nation status, and the
European Community offered technical economic assistance.
Unlike some former Soviet republics such as Armenia,
Lithuania, and Ukraine, Georgia lacked a large number of
emigrants in the West who could establish links to the outside
world once internal conditions made such connections possible.
Small groups of Georgian exiles lived in Paris and other European
capitals, but they were mostly descended from members of the
Social Democratic government that had been forced into exile with
the incorporation of Georgia into the Soviet empire in 1921.
The only large group of emigrants that maintained contact
with Georgia were Georgian Jews who had taken advantage of the
Soviet Union's expansion of Jewish emigration rights in the 1970s
and 1980s. Because Jews had lived in Georgia for many centuries
and because Georgia had no history of anti-Semitism, many
Georgian Jews continued to feel an attachment to Georgia and its
culture, language, and people. Largely as a result of these ties,
relations between Georgia and Israel flourished on many levels.
Data as of March 1994
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