EurasiaNet Eurasia Insight - Georgia Will Use "All Available Means" to Oust Russian Peacekeepers from Abkhazia

EURASIA INSIGHT

GEORGIA WILL USE "ALL AVAILABLE MEANS" TO OUST RUSSIAN PEACEKEEPERS FROM ABKHAZIA - PRESIDENT
Nina Akhmeteli 5/28/08

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Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili’s first meeting with new Russian leader Dmitry Medvedev in early June now promises to be a fiery affair. Armed with the findings of a UN report that holds Russia responsible for shooting down a Georgian drone over the breakaway region of Abkahzia, Saakashvili has announced that Tbilisi will use "all means and all ways" to try to push Russian peacekeepers out of the conflict zone.

The two men are scheduled to parlay at a June 6-7 meeting of CIS leaders in St. Petersburg, Russia. Speaking during a televised session of Georgia’s National Security Council on May 27, Saakashvili stated that Russia could no longer be trusted to act as an impartial peace-broker in Abkhazia. Moscow, he insisted, "pretends to play at peacekeeping" in Abkhazia and such misbehavior "annuls this peacekeeping role."

"It is absolutely clear that Georgia cannot remain in such a situation when we all, together with our international partners, are sitting and waiting for [a new] provocation," he said. Saakashvili did not specify precisely how Tbilisi would try to overhaul Abkhazia’s peacekeeping format.

The Georgian president cited two recent developments as justification for Georgia’s diplomatic offensive. The first was an April 16 unilateral decision by Moscow to establish trade and political ties with Georgia’s two separatist entities � Abkhazia and South Ossetia. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

He also called attention to the April 20 incident, in which a Russian military jet shot down an unmanned Georgian reconnaissance plane off the coast of Abkhazia. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

Despite vociferous Russian denials, a report released May 26 by the United Nations Observer Mission in Georgia (UNOMIG) determined that a Russian military jet indeed downed the Georgian drone. UNOMIG’s findings were also critical of Georgia, saying that Georgia’s reconnaissance flights appeared to violate a 1994 ceasefire agreement and created the appearance that Tbilisi was contemplating "a military operation."

By all indicators, Saakashvili won’t be receiving any love or understanding from Kremlin leaders in St. Petersburg. Even though the UNOMIG report contains extensive detail and documentation to support its findings, the Russian Foreign Ministry has attempted to cast doubt on its conclusions. "The quality of these investigations does not inspire confidence," a Foreign Ministry statement claimed. In effect, the Kremlin has given the brush off to a Georgian demand for an apology and compensation.

The UN report, nevertheless, is emboldening Tbilisi as it confronts the giant to the north. And the rhetoric of Saakashvili’s leading lieutenants has been even more alarmist and confrontational than his own. In comments appearing May 28 in the Russian daily Kommersant, Georgian Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili indicated that Russia would stop at nothing to prevent Georgia’s long-sought accession to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.

"The Russians are forcing the Abkhaz to prepare for war," Merabishvili insisted.

Meanwhile, Temur Iakobashvili, the Georgian state minister for reintegration, said during a May 28 interview broadcast on a Tbilisi radio station, that Tbilisi would not be bullied by the Kremlin. "We will not tolerate [losing Abkhazia]," he insisted. "We will even go to war, if necessary."

The UNOMIG report determined that either a MiG-29 Fulcrum or a Su-27 Flanker military jet shot down the drone. After heading south toward the drone and the ceasefire line, and shooting down the aircraft, the plane "turned back to the north, heading toward [the city of] Maykop/Krasnodar [region] in Russian airspace," the report found. The point of take-off, another contentious topic, is not defined.

"Absent compelling evidence to the contrary, this leads to the conclusion that the aircraft belonged to the Russian air force," the mission found. The report described the incident as "fundamentally inconsistent" with the 1994 cease-fire agreement, adding that it "undercuts the ceasefire and separation of forces regime."

The UNOMIG report also stated video footage taken by the drone, showing a fighter jet firing an air-to-air missile, was authentic - recorded "without any manipulation or cut-outs or copy/paste actions." Moscow had earlier claimed that the footage was doctored.

Although the report also found fault with Georgia, experts in Tbilisi generally believe that UNOMIG’s findings can help Georgia in two ways � strengthening its case for the replacement of Russian peacekeepers, and enhancing its arguments for NATO admission.

"The UNOMIG report might not be decisive, but it definitely is a serious piece of evidence, which strengthens our position and helps us to change the peacekeeping format or, at least, de-monopolize Russia’s role in it," commented Archil Gegeshidze, a senior fellow at the Georgian Foundation for Strategic and International Studies in Tbilisi. "The issue of reviewing the peace format is picking up steam, and the report will speed it up [further]."

"It seems that the situation is changing at the UN level," added Giorgi Khutsishvili, chairman of the International Center on Conflict and Negotiation. "And these changes are positive for us."

As for Georgia’s NATO membership aspirations, Atlantic Alliance representatives remain cautious on the topic. NATO Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer indicated on May 27 that both foreign and domestic developments would factor into the decision-making process on admission. De Hoop Scheffer emphasized that it was vital for Georgia to "demonstrate democratic maturity and stay on the reform track."

"We are obviously keeping a particularly close eye on Georgia and its relations with Russia, and will continue to urge moderation and respect for Georgia’s sovereignty and territorial integrity," the secretary-general added.

Some analysts in Tbilisi are cautioning against unrealistic expectations concerning the extent of Western support for Georgia. Paata Zakareishvili, a member of the opposition Republican Party, argued that European Union member states cannot be counted on to exert meaningful pressure on Moscow. "Europe will do anything to not confront Russia because of Georgia," said Zakareishvili, citing the EU’s energy dependence on the Kremlin.

Zakareishvili contended that a "real" strategic victory for Georgia could be achieved only through the resumption of direct talks with representatives of the Abkhaz separatist leadership. Such direct contacts were severed in 2006, after Georgia carried out a police operation in the Upper Kodori Gorge, the only piece of Abkhazia still under Tbilisi’s control.

Editor�s Note: Nina Akhmeteli is a freelance reporter based in Tbilisi.

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