Zourabichvili: We Agreed to Close Bases by January 1, 2008

Georgian Foreign Minister Salome Zourabichvili said in a live interview with Rustavi 2 television on April 25 that she agreed with her Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov during talks on Monday in Moscow that Russia will close down its military bases in Batumi and Akhalkalaki by January 1, 2008.

?We made concrete progress during the today?s talks. Progress has been made on three different issues. The first one is about the deadline [of the military bases closure]. We have, practically, agreed that January 1, 2008 will be the deadline for the withdrawal of these bases. The second issue is related to the launch of this [withdrawal] process. We have also agreed about this; it is necessary to undertake concrete steps which will demonstrate to the people that something has been launched, that this process has been launched, as soon as the Presidents [of Georgia and Russia] agree on the agreement. And the third part of this agreement is that this should be a step-by-step process, so that we should know what will happen by the end of 2005, what will happen by 2006 and what will happen by the end of 2007. And this is very important, because [it will help us] to avoid misunderstandings at any stage [of the withdrawal process]? We should avoid even a slight misunderstanding, so we have also agreed to develop a detailed, technical part to this document to make all the aspects [of the withdrawal process] clear,? Salome Zourabichvili said.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov announced at a news conference on April 25 that Russia might start the withdrawal of its bases from Georgia as early as 2005.

This post is also available in: ქართული (Georgian) Русский (Russian)