Russian MFA Lambasts Georgia
Deputy Foreign Minister of Russia Valery Loshchinin issued a report on Russia’s relations with Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries in which he lambasted the policies of the new Georgian leadership, Regnum reports.
The report states that Russia made efforts to “normalize relations” with the new Georgian leadership, but fell short of their aim because of the position taken by the Georgian side.
Specifically, the report states that Georgia “failed to alleviate Russian concerns regarding the presence of Chechen terrorists in the Pankisi gorge, activities of Maskhadovist [rebel President of Chechnya Aslan Maskhadov] structures [organizations] in Tbilisi and allowed its leadership a possibility to access the local media, as well as transfer weapons to gangs active in Chechnya.”
According to the report, positive development of Russo-Gerogian relations stopped in the summer of 2004, as a “difference between the political declarations of the Georgian leadership and its practical actions towards Russia and the settlement of the Abkhaz and South Ossetian problems became more and more apparent.”
According to Loshchinin, work on a so called “framework agreement” between the two countries has stalled because the Georgian side has remained inflexible and “differences in the settlement of the Georgian-Abkhaz and Georgian Ossetian [conflicts]” persist.
He says “Georgia avoided including a legally binding refusal to station the military of the third countries or offering them military infrastructure in the agreement.” Without these assurances in place, the agreement would “not correspond to the interests of both sides.”
The report also notes that “practically abolishing the Adjarian autonomy”, military pressure on South Ossetia and the use of military force in the sea near Abkhazia as a proof of Tbilisi’s agressive policies.
The report reiterates that in the South Ossetian conflict zone, the Joint Control Commission (JCC) is the “only capable mechanism” of conflict settlement that has “proved its effectiveness” in 2004. “We do not see the need to create of any other format [of negotiations]” the report says.
