In South Ossetia, meanwhile, the authorities have remained completely silent on the issue. Most residents in both territories hold Russian citizenship, raising the prospect they could be drafted.
Georgians and Russians have not had such close contact, and on such a scale, since the breakup of Soviet Union. Now they are figuring each other out again.
Many outsiders have been calling on Georgia to take advantage of Russian weakness to reclaim its lost territories. But Georgians themselves aren’t having it.
The incumbent has come under fire for a controversial military deployment to Ukraine, and it’s not clear that a proposal to annex the territory to Russia will help him.