MPs Push for Peacekeepers’ Pullout – Georgia’s UN Envoy

There is “a political pressure” from the Georgian Parliament on the government to execute a resolution on withdrawal of Russian peacekeeping troops from the Abkhaz and South Ossetian conflict zones, Irakli Alasania, the Georgia’s ambassador to the UN, said.

In a resolution, passed last July, the Parliament has already instructed the government to “to launch necessary procedures to immediately suspend the so-called peacekeeping operations” in Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The issue was revitalized after the incident in Ganmukhuri. Georgian ministers of defense, interior and foreign affairs met with senior lawmakers on October 31 to discuss the issue.

“There is a political pressure from the Parliament on the executive branch to start thinking about terms of [peacekeepers’] withdrawal. So we will see in few days probably the approach we will take,” Irakli Alasania said at a news conference in New York. “Now it will take internal debates in the Georgian government on how to deal with the timing and the approaches that they will chose and how to execute decisions that has been made by the Parliament.”

At the news conference Irakli Alasania briefed about the details of the Ganmukhuri incident and said that it was “unprovoked attack” by the Russian servicemen on the Georgian police unit guarding a youth patriotic camp in Ganmukhuri in the Abkhaz conflict zone.

At the news conference he also showed a video footage (wmv file, 2 min 51), showing Russian peacekeepers detaining and beating five Georgian police officers.

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