The State Minister for Reconciliation and Civic Equality Ketevan Tsikhelashvili met with priests and the parish of the Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Holy Church, the Surb Sarkis Church.

During the meeting the State Minister talked about the new initiative. In particular, with the initiative of the State Minister's Office and with the support of the Zurab Zhvania’s School of Public Administration, in September special courses of Georgian language will be opened in the Surb Sarkis Church of Ninotsminda municipality for local clergy and parish.

"I am very glad that such interest and commitment comes from your side. Today I came in order to demonstrate our full readiness to maximize the level of knowledge of Georgian language through concrete steps and overcome this, one of the important, challenges together with you.

According to Ketevan Tsikhelashvili, the knowledge of the state language, not only in the Samtskhe-Javakheti region, but also in other regions populated by ethnic minorities, still remains a challenge. To solve this problem is one of the main priorities of civil integration policy.

"Improvement of the level of knowledge of the state language is a complex process that requires lots of efforts in all the stages of learning. We already took lot of steps in this direction and in future we are going to be more active.

It is still a barrier that significantly hinders the full participation of citizens in the country's political, economic and social life. Georgia is a country where every citizen is equal and this equality means involvement and awareness.

We really have an ambition to achieve this goal, to give all our citizen's the opportunity to be fully engaged in all areas of the country life.

For our country, especially in such an intensive phase of development, the talent, ability and opportunity of each of us is the unique resource".

The meeting was attended by the Deputy Minister of Education, Science, Culture and Sport, the Head of Zurab Zhvania’s School of Public Administration Ketevan Makharashvili, Mayor of Ninotsminda Anivard Mosoyan.