The Committee voted and approved a visa waiver for Georgia with 44 votes in favour, five against and one abstention late on Monday.
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Committee on Civil Liberties, Justice and Home Affairs is the main institution within European Parliament to approve visa liberalization regime for non-EU countries.
The EU-Georgia visa liberalisation dialogue started in 2012 and by the end of 2015, the European Commission had concluded that the country had fulfilled all the benchmarks.
Visa liberalization for Turkey is an even more contentious process, with Ankara threatening to stop blocking Syrian refugees from crossing to Greece unless it wins concessions from Brussels.
EU Parliament member Maria Gabriel said visa-free travel to the Schengen Zone is a vitally important step for both Georgia and Kosovo towards strengthening their economic and cultural relations with EU members and add a further impetuous for the governments in Tbilisi and Pristina to pursue widespread political and human rights reforms. Following sessions in the plenary are scheduled for October 3-6 and then for October 24-27, civil.ge reported.
Following the abolition of visas for the citizens of Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia in 2009 and for Albania and Bosnia and Herzegovina in 2010, Kosovo was left isolated as the only Balkan country whose citizens still needed a visa to travel to the EU.
MEPs from the LIBE committee also voted in favor of opening inter-institutional negotiations on Georgia’s visa waiver proposal – a legislative procedure when the European Parliament enters into negotiations on a legislative proposal with other EU institutions, including the Council, whose approval is also required for the visa liberalisation to enter into force.
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Once Parliament as a whole and the Council endorse the legislative changes, Georgian citizens will be able to enter the European Union without a visa for 90 days in any 180-day period, provided they hold a biometric passport.
