"We want to expand the ministry for refugees and assign some new duties for it. From now on, the ministry will also be in charge of resettlement issues and oversee Georgia's ties with compatriots living abroad," Saakashvili told a briefing Friday.
He said up to ten million ethnic Georgians were living outside the country.
"Last year, we introduced dual citizenship. Since then, more than a thousand of our compatriots have become Georgian citizens, but we want to raise the figure to several thousand," Saakashvili said.
The president said he was sure that the new ministry would establish good spiritual and cultural ties with Georgians residing in other countries.
Saakashvili also said that the ministry's main objective at home would be to conduct the inventory of the property of the Georgians and people of other ethnicities who had to flee Abkhazia and South Ossetia, two self-proclaimed republics that broke away from Georgia in the early 1990s, after the USSR collapsed.
"I do not advise anybody to buy abandoned apartments and other immovable property that earlier belonged to Georgian or other people," Saakashvili said. "I warn you and promise that the property would be returned to its lawful owners."
The former minister for refugees, Eteri Astemirova, tendered resignation Friday morning, citing reorganization of the ministry as a reason.
