Georgia protests russian blockade - EU offers no help
- From: lorad474@xxxxxx
- Date: 16 Jul 2006 23:54:04 -0700
For educational purposes:
"Georgia seeks G8 help on Russia blockade
14.07.2006| By Andrew Rettman
EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - With the G8 summit less than 24 hours away,
small post-Soviet country Georgia wants the EU to send a message to
Russia to stop bullying its neighbours with economic blockades, amid
escalating tension in the EU's Black Sea neighbourhood.
"We are not asking anyone to isolate Russia or to go back to Cold War
language," Georgia's EU ambassador Salome Samadashvili told EUobserver
on Thursday (13 July). "But we hope the EU sends a message that if you
want to be a member of the industrialised, democratic nations there are
certain rules, that having energy reserves does not excuse everything."
Tensions rose between Russia and post-Rose Revolution state Georgia on
8 July when Russia closed the Larsi border crossing - the only legal
crossing between the two countries - cutting off transit for Georgian
and Armenian people and trade.
Russia says the move is needed to stymie Georgian smuggling gangs, but
Georgia sees the blockade as the latest in a series of Russian moves to
poison bilateral relations and problematise Georgia's post-2003
pro-NATO and pro-EU political orientation.
Russia in May and June banned imports of Georgian wine and mineral
water. It maintains business interests and 2,000 to 3,000
"peacekeeping" troops in the breakaway Georgian republics of Abkhazia
and South Ossetia. In January, Russian gas pipes to Georgia
mysteriously blew up.
With South Ossetia existing as a de facto state for some 15 years, Ms
Samadashvili warns that the region has become a hub of criminal
activity that poses a danger to wider European security no matter how
remote the Black Sea might seem to public opinion in the west.
"It's not just some piece of land that concerns only Georgians...this
is your neighbourhood," she said. "[In the past few months] we have
arrested people carrying false dollars from this region that end up in
far away places, people involved in drug trafficking, people smuggling
nuclear materials."
Abkhazia and South Ossetia broke away from Georgia in the early 1990s
in civil wars that saw some 25,000 dead and 350,000 refugees. Russia
originally trained Chechen guerrilla Shamil Basayev to fight Georgians
in Abkhazia before it "assassinated" him on 10 July, Ms Samadashvili
said.
Pre-G8 tension
In a further sign of worsening relations, Russian foreign minister
Sergei Lavrov on Wednesday told press that Russian secret service
agents had uncovered a Georgian plot to stage provocative military
action on the South Ossetia border during the G8 summit.
"I hope all that talk is ungrounded because otherwise it will be a
signal for new bloodshed," Mr Lavrov told Russian newswire Ria Novosti.
Russian president Vladimir Putin has also indicated that Abkhazia and
South Ossetia should look to Montenegro and Kosovo as models for
independence.
But Tbilisi's view is diametrically opposed to Moscow's, with Ms
Samadashvili saying that Georgia is committed to an OSCE blueprint for
peaceful conflict resolution, despite some belligerent statements by
individual Georgian parliamenterians.
"The Georgian government is trying very hard to normalise relations
with our neighbour and unfortunately they are doing, in a very
persistent way, the opposite," she stated.
The ambassador indicated that any referendums on independence in
Abkhazia or South Ossetia would be illegitimate because Russia in the
1990s aided separatist forces in expelling 350,000 Georgians from
Abkhazia and there are no UN agreements on how to decide the regions'
status.
Ms Samadashvili also scorned Mr Putin's recent remarks that the western
critique of Russian political values is a form of "neo-collonialism."
Mr Putin said on 12 July that the west has replaced "civilisation" with
"democratisation" in a new rhetoric that smacks of Europe's 19th
century African adventure.
"It is neo-collonialism when you are trying to prevent your neighbours
from taking the course of development they have chosen for themselves,"
the ambassador stated. "The bottom line is that Georgia is an
independent country that is free to make its own choices about its
future."
Georgian realism
In contrast to other post-Soviet states Ukraine and Moldova, which are
seeking clear EU political statements that they will one day join the
club, Georgia is prioritising NATO membership and is happy with the
European Neighbourood Policy framework for EU relations.
"We are realistic," Ms Samadashvili indicated, referring to the EU's
sensitive internal debate on future enlargement as well as the fact
that Georgia still has some way to go before it becomes "a functional
western democracy," with some NGOs criticising it on electoral and
press freedom standards.
She declined to attack the EU for its refusal to send border monitors
to Abkhazia and South Ossetia despite saying that an international
presence is needed to revive the moribund OSCE peace plan based on
demilitarisation, bigger EU aid flows and multilateral status talks.
"We need to have an international presence in the Roki Tunnel
[controlling access to South Ossetia] and there is reluctance from
everyone to do so because Russia is opposed to the idea," Ms
Samadashvili said.
Hint of grievance
But scratch the surface, and there is a hint of grievance that Europe
has forgotten its support for Georgia's Rose Revolution almost three
years ago.
"In the past 60 years, our history was the same as Romania, Bulgaria
and the Baltic states," the ambassador indicated. "The only difference
is that we were conquered by the Soviet empire 30 years before they
were."
http://euobserver.com/9/22086
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