Russian Negotiator Signals Sympathy to Georgian Plan in South Ossetia

Commening on the meeting of the Joint Control Commission (JCC), Russian Special Envoy Valarie Kenyaikin said despite heated debates, there seems to be “an agreement” on a “three-stage scheme” which foresees the “demilitarization of the zone of Georgian-South Ossetian conflict, economic and social rehabilitation projects and, at the last stage, political settlement.”

Kenyaikin’s description matches, but does not directly refer to, the Peace Plan proposed by the Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili earlier this year, which South Ossetia rejected and Russia refrained from supporting. The Russian negotiator made no comment on Georgian demands voiced at the JCC to expand the role of the OSCE, the EU and the United States in the negotiating format.

Georgia’s Prime Minister Zurab Nogaideli, who recently visited the United States, said the US will back the Georgian plan at the pending OSCE assembly.