EU Official: Need for Monitors’ Access to Breakaway Regions Raised with Russia

EU will keep raising with Russia the need for allowing European monitors to access breakaway South Ossetia and Abkhazia, Ambassador Olof Skoog of the EU’s Political and Security Committee said in Tbilisi on November 13.

“We need to do what we’ve done so far – we have to reiterate with those who have influence, not least the Russian Federation, that the mission is not able to do its work fully unless it is able to operate in the entire territory of Georgia. We do not miss any opportunity to raise this with the Russian Federation, so I think that’s the way we will continue,” he said at a joint news conference with Georgian Foreign Minister, Grigol Vashadze.

Head of EU Monitoring Mission, Hansjörg Haber, said at the same news conference that although the mission already had an access to satellite imagery through cooperation with EU Satellite Centre, “satellite pictures can not tell you everything; it can not entirely replace monitoring on the ground.”

Ambassadors from EU’s Political and Security Committee, who are visiting Georgia on November 12-14, spent the day on Thursday with EUMM including in its field offices. Ambassador Skoog said the mission was doing an “excellent work.”

Foreign Minister Vashadze said that success of EUMM’s work should not be judged based on whether it was able or not to access occupied territories.

“The mission is already a success, because the mission is an objective, unbiased monitor of what is happening on the ground,” Vashadze said.

Ambassador Skoog said that presence of the EU monitors was very important to “deflate tensions” amid recent allegations, including from Russia, about developments in the Georgian-controlled areas adjacent to breakaway regions’ administrative borders. There have been cases in the past when Russia or authorities in breakaway South Ossetia were accusing Tbilisi of military build-up close to the administrative borders, but the claims were not confirmed by the European monitors.

Ambassadors from EU’s Political and Security Committee held series of meeting with Georgia’s senior officials, including with President Saakashvili, as well as with a group of non-parliamentary opposition leaders on November 13.

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