Saakashvili Ready to Meet Kokoity

President Saakashvili is ready to meet directly with South Ossetian leader Eduard Kokoity in the southern Georgian town of Bakuriani, Georgian PM Zurab Nogaideli told the OSCE Permanent Council in Vienna on October 27.

“This step, indeed this new initiative, is intended to create dialogue, build trust, and create a powerful signal that there is no alternative to peace,” Nogaideli said.

?Bakuriani is home to thousands of Ossetians who for centuries have lived in peace and harmony with their neighbors outside the Tskhinvali/South Ossetia district ? despite the recent conflict,? Nogaideli added.

But many ethnic Ossetian families had to flee Bakuriani during the conflict in South Ossetia in early 90s.

During a visit to Tbilisi on October 2 the OSCE Chairman-in-Office, Belgian Foreign Minister Karel De Gucht, called on the Georgian and South Ossetian sides to hold talks at the ?highest-level.?

Foreign Minister of breakaway South Ossetia Murat Jioyev told Rustavi 2 television on October 27 that proposing a venue ? Bakuriani – for possible talks as a precondition of the meeting is unacceptable, adding that the venue should be negotiated.

He also said that signing an agreement on the non-resumption of hostilities should be the goal of a high-level meeting.

But President Saakashvili made it clear in September during his address to the UN General Assembly Session in New York that Georgia will sign such an agreement only after the internationalization of the peacekeeping operation in South Ossetia.

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