Georgia: Escalating tension with Russia - full text
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Immediate Context
On Sept. 7, Igor Kokoev, a 24 year old resident of Tskhinvali (the capital of the Georgian separatist region of South Ossetia), was wounded by an explosive planted in a mobile telephone. South Ossetian interior minister Mikhail Mindzayevon described the explosion to the RES news agency as a “terrorist attack” masterminded by the Georgian authorities in order to destabilise the region. The mobile telephone explosion followed an incident on Aug. 28, when a lorry carrying Russian peacekeepers collided with a Georgian passenger bus on the Tbilisi–Zugdidi highway in the separatist Abkhazian region of Georgia. The Georgian military police disarmed and detained the Russian peacekeepers as they had violated their mandate by failing to notifying the Georgian authorities that they would be moving outside their operational zone in Abkhazia. The Georgian police released the peacekeepers on Aug. 29.
The Sept. 7 explosion and the detention of the Russian troops were the latest in a series of incidents exposing the tensions in the separatist regions of Georgia. Russian support for the breakaway regions of Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Adzharia had been a source of friction between the two countries since Georgia became independent in 1991.
The Georgian government alleged that Russian aircraft had violated Georgian airspace three times during August, confirming on Aug. 24 that Georgian forces opened fire on a Russian aircraft in Georgian airspace on Aug. 22. The Russian authorities denied the violation and did not report any of its aircraft as missing.
The Georgian authorities also accused the Russian airforce of dropping a missile near Tbilisi, the Georgian capital, on Aug. 6. Georgia alleged that a jet plane fired a Soviet-era KH-58 radar-seeking missile at a Georgian air-defence installation near the city of Gori, about 50 miles from Tbilisi. The missile had not exploded and there had been no casualties.
An investigation confirmed the violation of Georgian airspace on Aug. 6, but the Russian government accused Georgia of fabricating the missile attack. The Inter-governmental Expert Group (IIEG-2), composed of experts from Estonia, the UK, and Poland, later confirmed that Russian aircraft had violated Georgian airspace three times during August. On Aug.7, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, visited the site of the alleged missile attack and called for the EU to investigate the incident.
In a statement on its website on Aug. 25, an official from the Georgian ministry of foreign affairs expressed concern over events in Abkhazia: as well as the infringements of airspace, the separatist authorities in Abkhazia had organised a large-scale military exercise under the guidance of Russia, with over 6,000 armed individuals being trained by the Russian armed forces. The ministry called for the Russian government to “end its destructive acts against Georgia”.
On July 18, Georgia's Parliament (the unicameral legislature had approved a resolution demanding the withdrawal of Russian peacekeeping troops from the Abkhaz and South Ossetian conflict zones. The resolution identified Russia's peacekeeping role as “a permanent attempt to annex Georgia’s territory”.
Reaction and Outlook
The continued presence of the Russian military in Georgia's separatist regions was widely seen as obstructing Georgia's attempts to forge links with the West. The Russian media reported that the Georgian government used the alleged Russian invasion of Georgian airspace in order to promote Georgia's application to join NATO. On Aug. 24, the International Herald Tribune reported that the Georgian foreign minister Gela Bezhuashvili had announced that he would make an official tour of a number of key NATO countries in early September.
On Sept. 6, an investigation undertaken by the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE concluded that an envoy should be appointed to deal with the escalating tension between Georgia and Russia. On Sept. 6, Miomir Zuzul head of the OSCE investigation, referred to the Aug. 6 missile incident as a “dangerous situation, and it was not the first incident or an isolated one”.
Historical Context
Inhabited since prehistoric times, the area had been occupied by such powers as the Greeks, Romans, Persians, Seljuks, Mongols, Ottomans, and Safarid Iranians, with a Georgian identity nevertheless surviving. In 1801 most of present-day Georgia became part of the Russian empire, when Tsar Paul I of Russia effectively annexed the country. Georgia briefly reclaimed its independence in 1918, but was invaded by the Soviet Union's Red Army in February 1921. A puppet government was installed, with Georgia eventually being incorporated into the Transcaucasian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (SFSR) with Armenia and Azerbaijan, before becoming the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic (SSR) in 1936.
On April 9, 1991, following support for independence in a referendum, the Georgian Supreme Soviet (the unicameral legislature declared the “restoration of state independence”. Similar declarations by other SSRs precipitated the dissolution of the Soviet Union on Dec. 21, 1991.
Tension quickly escalated between newly independent Georgia and Russia, largely concerning control of the Georgian regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, where there were significant pro-Russian separatist movements. Abkhazia had unsuccessfully attempted to assert its independence in August 1990. Fighting broke out between Georgian troops and Abkhazian separatists in September 1992, threatening to draw Georgia into conflict with Russia. A Georgian-Abkhaz ceasefire agreement was established in July 1993, with Russia agreeing to send troops to Abkhazia as neutral peacekeepers.
In October 2001 renewed fighting broke out in Abkhazia in response to Georgia's growing opposition to the presence of Russian peacekeepers in Abkhazia. Russian President Vladimir Putin stated that Russia would not be drawn into a war with Georgia and was prepared to withdraw the Russian peacekeepers. However, tension remained high between the two countries, with the Russian government accusing Georgia of harbouring rebels from the southern Russian republic of Chechnya.
In September 2006, the Georgian authorities arrested four Russian intelligence officers on spying charges. Deputy Prime Minister Vano Merabishvili stated that the four army officers had been planning a “serious provocation” and had shown a particular interest in “Georgia's defence capability”. In October 2006, in the wake of the arrests, Russia began to impose severe sanctions against Georgia as well as Georgian citizens and businesses in Russia. Imports of wine and mineral water (Georgia's main exports) were banned due to supposed health concerns and Russian President Putin closed a number of air, road, rail, and sea transport links, asserting that this was a measure intended to prevent Georgia from using military force to regain control of the regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. However, the sanctions were interpreted as retaliation to the arrest of the Russian intelligence officers in September 2006.
Relations between the two countries continued to deteriorate in early 2006. In January 2006, Saakashvili accused the Russian authorities of “sabotage” after a series of gas pipeline blasts left large areas of Georgia and Armenia without energy.
In February 2006, Georgia's Parliament approved a non-binding resolution claiming Russia was attempting to “annex” South Ossetia and calling on President Saakashvili to ensure the withdrawal of Russian peacekeepers from South Ossetia and their replacement by an international force.
