Tbilisi Says ‘No’ to JCC Session in Moscow

The Georgian side will agree to participate in a session of the quadripartite Joint Control Commission (JCC) only in Tbilisi or Tskhinvali, capital of breakaway South Ossetia, the Georgian Deputy State Minister for Conflict Resolution Issues Giorgi Volsky told Civil Georgia on February 20.

Initially, talks within the frames of the JCC – involving negotiators from Georgia, Russia, breakaway South Ossetia and Russia’s North Ossetia – were planned for February 20-21 in Vienna.

However, the Russian side refused to participate in these talks and instead offered to hold the meeting in Moscow.

“The Russian side cited the necessity to be close to the conflict zone when it proposed to hold the JCC session in Moscow instead of Vienna. So we think that because of this very same reason it would be better to hold a session in Tbilisi or in Tskhinvali, since these venues are much closer to the conflict zone,” Giorgi Volsky said.