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The News in Brief

Tuesday, November 2
Prince Edward to visit Tbilisi

The British Embassy in Tbilisi is pleased to announce that His Royal Highness, Prince Edward, Earl of Wessex KG KCVO will visit Georgia on 4 -5 November 2010. He will officially open the new British Embassy premises in Krtsanisi, Tbilisi.

His Royal Highness will meet senior members of the Georgian Government and British business representatives. His Royal Highness will also learn about BP’s operations in Georgia, the work of the European Union Monitoring Mission (EUMM) and the art links established by the British Council in Georgia.

Her Majesty’s Ambassador to Georgia, Judith Gough commented on the forthcoming visit:

“I am delighted that His Royal Highness will be visiting Georgia for the historic opening of our new purpose built Embassy. Our new premises demonstrate the importance that the UK places in its relationship with Georgia. His Royal Highness will experience first hand the breadth of our relations, which cover areas as diverse as political cooperation, cultural ties, and trade and investment. My Embassy will continue to work to strengthen this relationship, in particular developing our commercial links”.
(The British Embassy in Tbilisi)



Iranian Foreign Minister to visit Georgia

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Iran, Manouchehr Mottaki will visit Georgia on November 3, stated the Deputy Foreign Minister of Georgia, Nino Kalandadze at the regular briefing held on November 1.

As part of the visit Manouchehr Mottaki will hold meetings with the Prime Minister of Georgia Nika Gilauri and the Minister of Foreign Affairs Grigol Vashadze. An agreement on visa-free regime between the two countries will be signed.

Minister of Foreign Affairs of Iran will also visit Adjaria and take part in the opening ceremony of the General Consulate of Iran in Batumi.
(Prime-News)



Georgian wine exhibited in Singapore

Georgian wines were exhibited at the annual international wine exhibition “Wine for Asia” held in Singapore for the first time this year. Georgian wine won silver and bronze medals at the event, in which dozens of world’s leading wine makers took part. 12 companies from Georgia participated in the exhibition with the support of the ministry of agriculture of Georgia.

Businessmen say this success was significant for Georgia because Asian markets could provide serious opportunities for Georgian products in the future.
(Rustavi 2)



New Rules for Mobile Companies

New rules for mobile companies came into force on November 1.

The National Communications Regulatory Commission of Georgia has decided to introduce new rules for mobile companies operating in Georgia. Each cellular communication company is obliged to offer a new service to its customers

In case of interest from a client’s side each mobile company is obliged to offer any service package to its customers within its network without changing index and the mobile phone number. For instance consumers of a mobile company “Geocell” can become “Lai-Lai” package customers without changing their index and mobile’s phone number.
(Prime-News)



Tbilisi City Hall reduces Public Transport routes

From November 1, Tbilisi City Hall changed the routing scheme for public transport reducing the number of routes.

According to the urban transport service, up to now, there have been 125 bus routes operating in Tbilisi, but as a result of an optimisation process only 92 routes will remain.

“A reform of the urban transport system is linked to the fact that many routes are overloaded and do not have enough buses, while some routes are used only by a few passengers,” Akaki Dzhokhadze, the head of the transport service told journalists.

He explained that buses will be replaced by mini-buses in districts in Tbilisi with difficult access.

Akaki Dzhokhadze also stated that bus drivers who lose their jobs as a result of the optimisation, will be retrained as minibus drivers.

The reduction in the number of bus routes has caused discontent among residents of the remote districts of the capital, who claim that this initiative will cause serious difficulties in traveling and have additional costs, since as from today they will have to change modes of transport to reach the central parts of the city.
(Prime-News)