U.S. Official: S.Ossetian Referendum ‘Ambiguous’

U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Matthew Bryza said on November 17 that two referendums in South Ossetia with different results showed that staging referendums in “extremely complex situations” does not help to resolve conflicts. 

“What happened in South Ossetia is ambiguous, I mean the referendum. One grouping, South Ossetians, voted in one particular way without any credible international monitoring of the process. The other major ethnic grouping, which was unable to participate [in the first one], organized its own referendum with a completely different result. I think that shows that this process of referendum in the middle of extremely complex situations where one ethnic group has been moved out in the middle of the conflict, does not provide any necessary precedent or guaranteed way to resolve these conflicts,” Bryza said at a news conference in Tbilisi.

He met with the Georgian President, Prime Minister and newly appointed Defense Minister Davit Kezerashvili in Tbilisi on November 17. On November 18 he plans to meet with Abkhaz officials in Sokhumi.

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