The European Commission will delay its next assessment of Georgia's progress toward meeting the priorities required before it can be considered for EU membership, giving the country more time to make its case before the bloc.
Michael Rupp, a representative of the European Commission enlargement directorate, on July 13 said the delay was intended to give Tbilisi "proper time to work carefully" on meeting the priorities to win European Union candidate status.
The commission will now assess Georgia's implementation of required steps sometime in 2023 and not in December of this year as originally intended.
Rupp said the commission had been "very interested" to see Georgia work "hard, deep, and thoroughly" on the priorities.
He said EU officials did not want to "rush" Georgia, given the political disputes in the South Caucasus country over ways to implement Brussels' 12-point program.
The delay "will give Georgia's political system the right time to work carefully on these priorities," he said.
Kakha Gogolashvili, director of the Center for European Studies at the Tbilisi-based Rondeli Foundation, told RFE/RL that the delay was in one way a sad fact for Georgia, since "all recommendations could easily be implemented in a timely manner."
"On the other hand, it may be a good thing -- because, in fact, there is no chance that we will comply with the 12 points by the end of this year."
Georgia has been gripped by months of unrest, with tens of thousands of people taking to the streets of Tbilisi to protest what the opposition sees as the government's failure to make progress on the required reforms.
Protesters have demanded the resignation of Prime Minister Irakli Gharibashvili and the formation of a new government of "national accord."
While deferring on Georgia, the EU at the same time formally agreed to take the "historic" step of making Ukraine and Moldova candidates for EU membership in the midst of the war in Ukraine.
Gharibashvili has said his government is "mobilized" to meet the requirements set by Brussels "so that we get candidate status as soon as possible."
The European Commission said the conditions that Tbilisi must fulfill include ending political polarization, progress on media freedom, judiciary and electoral reforms, and "de-oligarchization."
Opinion polls show that at least 80 percent of the Georgian population favor plans to join the EU, as well as NATO, amid perceived threats from Russia.