Cheney Slams Russia’s ‘Brutality’ in Georgia
U.S. Vice-President Dick Cheney said Moscow’s “brutality” against Georgia was “simply the latest in a succession of troublesome and unhelpful actions by the Russian government.”
Speaking at the Ambrosetti Forum in Italy on September 6, Cheney also said the time to begin NATO Membership Action Plan (MAP) for Georgia and Ukraine “I believe has come.”
Before Italy, Cheney visited Azerbaijan, Georgia and Ukraine.
“Russian forces crossed an internationally recognized border into a sovereign state [Georgia]; fueled and fomented an internal conflict; conducted acts of war without regard for innocent life, killing civilians and causing the displacement of tens of thousands – all this against a nation that has a democratically elected government and an orientation towards the West,” he said.
“Russia has offered no satisfactory justification for the invasion – nor could it do so,” Cheney said. “Differing views on the status of these two areas, within the sovereign borders of the Georgian democracy, cannot justify a sudden and violent incursion by Russia.”
He said that recognizing South Ossetia and Abkhazia “only worsens the situation in the region.”
“In Georgia, we have provided unambiguous support to the people and to their elected government,” Cheney said.
On the Russian leadership’s goals, the U.S. vice president quoted former Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze, who said: “The goal of Russia is to restore the influence that it had during the Soviet period and during the empire period.”
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