Georgia Wants UN to Go to War. Without Any Certainty of Victory
rosbalt.com
(No discussion of Geogia should leave out the breakaway state of Abkhazia. It's a favorite resort area for senior Russian military and civilian figures. They seem much better organized then the Georgian government. ....pb)
A sitting of the UN Security Council is due take place in the next few days to discuss the question of settling the Abkhazian conflict. According to the press service of the Council of Ministers of the Abkhazian Autonomous Republic (the Abkhazian administration which is recognised by Tbilisi), Londer Tsaava, the Council of Minister's representative, has travelled to New York. He has taken with him 200,000 signatures of Georgian citizens who support the withdrawal of Russian peacekeepers from the conflict zone and want the UN to take concrete measures to end the conflict.
The official government in Georgia has not given up hope that the UN Security Council will resolve the Abkhazian problem in the way favoured by the Abkhazian leadership based in Tbilisi. It wants the UN to act according to the seventh chapter of its charter, which provides for the establishment of peace through the use of military force.
In connection with this, Inal Kazan, the head of the Abkhazian diaspora in the United States and the former US special representative of Vladislav Ardzinba, the Abkhazian president who is not recognised by Tbilisi, sent a letter to the Tbilisi centre for cultural relations Kavkazky Dom (Caucasus House). In this letter he spelt out his opposition to the Tbilisi-backed Abkhazian administration's plans for a final resolution of the conflict by the use of force. After a conflict with Ardzinba, Inal Kazan has twice been to Tbilisi. Last time, a month ago, he met with Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze and explained his plan for resolving the problem.
Essentially, his plan envisages the return of refugees from both sides to Abkhazia, the resolution of political and cultural priorities by the Abkhazian people, the inclusion of a sovereign Abkhazian Republic (with special status) in a unified Georgia, and the return to Abkhazia of 500 thousand Abkhazian Mohajeers, Muslims who were deported to Turkey in the 19th century. In his letter to Kavkazky Dom, Inal Kazan states that 'the Abkhazian people did not free themselves from the Georgian yoke simply to find themselves under it again'.
In response to this, the head of the Tbilisi-backed Abkhazian government issued a blunt statement asserting that, during his visit to Tbilisi, Kazan declared that the proposals by the leader of the US Abkhazian diaspora were bound to fail, and added that 'he is an opportunist and a hypocrite'. The so-called 'Dieter Boden document' (named after the former representative in Georgia of the UN Secretary General) envisages a 'sovereign Abkhazia' within the framework of a unified Georgia. However, the Abkhazian side is not planning to discuss the status of Abkhazia again because the rulers in Sukhumi are opposed to Abkhazia being included in Georgia under any status. Sergei Shamba, the Foreign Minister of the unofficial Republic of Abkhazia categorically declared that 'the status of Abkhazia was defined in 1994 in the Abkhazian constitution and has twice been confirmed by referendums held in Abkhazia'.
So, Londer Tsaava, the representative of the Tbilisi-backed Abkhazian government, has already gone to New York. But, Tamaz Nadareishvili, the Speaker of the Supreme Council of the Abkhazian Autonomous Republic, who does not recognise the legitimacy of the Sukhumi authorities, believes that the UN Security Council sitting will once again fail to take any decisive measures or real steps, and that a UN resolution will not deliver any results either for the Abkhazian or the Georgian side.
Zaza Tavadze, Tbilisi
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