Powell Comments on Georgia
At a new briefing after the OSCE Ministerial Council in Maastricht on December 2 U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell commented on summit and said that ?one of the issues of intense interest during this conference was the situation in Georgia.?
Below is transcript of Powell?s comments on Georgia:
One of the issues of intense interest during this conference was the situation in Georgia, and I?m pleased that the Acting President has committed herself to elections: free, fair, open and honest elections next month.
And a decision will have to be made as to whether that will include both presidential elections and parliamentary elections. But I?m confident that OSCE will be able to play an important role in helping with those elections, and the United States also intends to play a role in providing technical assistance and financial assistance. And I?ll be sending a team there later this week to work with the Acting President as she organizes for the election.
As I said in my prepared statement, all of us must respect the territorial integrity of Georgia and work with the Georgian people as they go through this challenging time in their history.
And the Georgian people can be assured of the friendship of the United States of America, and I think every OSCE member that I heard this morning and others who have spoken are also committed to a constitutional process in Georgia which will lead to a new government that will have been brought into office by free, fair and open elections and will be worthy of the name of an honest government that represents all of the Georgian people. With that, let me take a couple of questions that might be on your mind.
We believe that Russia should fulfill its obligations, its [1999 OSCE] Istanbul [Summit] obligations [to close down its military bases in Batumi and Akhalkalaki], and as I said in my statement earlier, I regret that Russia will not fulfill those obligations with respect to removing its troops by the end of this year. And we are concerned about the indefinite presence of Russian troops are in the Transnistria [Moldova] region, as well.
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