South Ossetia Crisis Recedes, but Russia-Georgia Arms Row Persists
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| Capital of breakaway South Ossetia |
“Due to coordinated activities by the Georgian government, international support and because of frequent contact with Russia and the United States, Georgia has avoided the bloody conflict which [de facto South Ossetian President] Kokoev and his backers in Russia wanted to launch,” Mikheil Saakashvili said, while speaking at the Tbilisi airport on July 12 before his departure to London.
He also said that the security of the Georgian villages in the breakaway region is ensured. President Saakashvili hailed the Georgian intelligence service and said that the Georgian side has “exact information regarding how many weapons and how many fighters were dispatched to South Ossetia from Russia.”
“At the moment, around 190 armed persons, who are criminals, are stationed in the Java district [of South Ossetia]. They infiltrated into the region from [neighboring Russia’s] North Ossetia. But they do not pose any threat to us,” Mikheil Saakashvili said.
He reiterated that reintegration of South Ossetia into Georgia “is only a matter of time.” “The most important thing is that we avoided a renewal of the armed conflict,” he added. “At the moment, only Tskhinvali, Java and Kvaisi districts are controlled by the separatists. These regions will be integrated back into Georgia,” the President continued. On July 11 Mikheil Saakashvili said that the reintegration will occur in “one year, maximum.”
The recent crisis in South Ossetia, which erupted on July 7 when Georgian troops intercepted Russian trucks loaded arms, eventually led to sporadic shootouts in the conflict zone that left seven Georgians wounded. The South Ossetian side has also reported that “several Ossetians were injured.”
Confiscation of the Russian missiles, which Tbilisi claims were delivered in the breakaway region in an effort to further equip South Ossetian militias, was followed by the arrest of dozens of Georgian peacekeepers, deployed in the conflict zone, by the South Ossetian side. On July 9 most of the Georgian soldiers were released with the exception of three men still being held in custody in Tskhinvali.
The confiscated unguided missiles and the three Georgian detained soldiers are the major bargaining chips being utilized by Moscow and Tbilisi at the moment.
“The Russian and the South Ossetian sides demand the return of the confiscated missiles back to South Ossetia. Tskhinvali agrees to release our soldiers only after this return of the missiles. But we will not exchange missiles for our soldiers. We will return the arms to Russians, but not to South Ossetia. We will not link these two issues,” Georgian State Minister Goga Khaindrava, who is in charge of the conflict resolution issues, told reporters on July 11.
Goga Khaindrava, together with Russian Foreign Ministry’s special envoy Lev Mironov, visited Tskhinvali on July 11, but their talks yielded no results and the three Georgians are not yet freed.
However, Lev Mironov told Itar-Tass news agency that the Georgian and South Ossetian sides “have agreed to refrain from any further provocative actions,” after negotiations on July 11.
State Minister Goga Khaindrava will visit Moscow on July 13-15 to hold talks with Secretary of the Russian Security Council Igor Ivanov, as well as other Russian officials.
Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, who warned Russia that the conflict in South Ossetia is an issue of bilateral Georgian-Russian relations and not an internal Georgian-Ossetian conflict, also reiterated on July 11 that Tbilisi will only return arms to areas within the Russian territory, not South Ossetia.
But Russia keeps insisting that the unguided missiles, most commonly employed by helicopter gun ships, are needed by Russian peacekeepers in the South Ossetian conflict zone for a helicopter command center.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov reiterated at a news briefing on July 11 that the deployment of two Russian helicopters into the conflict zone was agreed upon at the June 2 meeting of the Joint Control Commission (JCC), a body that includes representatives from Russia, Georgia, North Ossetia and South Ossetia. “Goga Khaindrava has signed this document from the Georgian side,” he added. However, Tbilisi claims that the document did not envisage the deployment of extra arms into the conflict zone.
It is expected that the issue of confiscated the arms and detained Georgians will top the agenda during the talks between Khaindrava and Ivanov in Moscow this week.