Unidentified people kidnapped Mamuka Arabuli, State Guard Service employee, in the Pankisi Valley yesterday morning. Embarrassed Kakheti (eastern Georgia) inhabitants thought that Kists had committed the kidnap (Kists -ethnically derived from Chechens and historically living on the territory of Georgia, Pankisi Valley. They are citizens of Georgia and are called Georgians). As a result they got armed, stopped a bus full of Kists and Chechen refugees and took 7 of them in hostage. Meanwhile, four were murdered and six were kidnapped in conflict zone of Abkhazia. Majority of them are ethnically Armenians. Abkhazians blamed the crime on Georgian partisans.
Anri Jergenia, the so-called prime minister of separatist Abkhazian Republic, sent a letter to Malkhaz Kakabadze, Minister of Special Affairs, saying that the cases of murder and kidnap occurred in the Kodori Valley (Abkhazia, Georgia) was organized by Georgian government and one of the Georgian armed groups had initiated the attack. As a result, the separatists refuse to continue participation in the Georgian-Abkhazian negotiation process, which means that the talks will be ceased at least for a while. `If we try to foresee the situation, armed groups of the separatists might try to enter the Kodori Valley in order to free the hostages, which actually means that war might be renovated`, `the Dilis Gazeti` says.
Georgian state denies accuses made by the separatists. According to Tamaz Nadareishvili, head of the Supreme Committee of Legal Government of Abkhazia, the strangers who have killed 4 and kidnapped 6 Armenians were Russians. One of the hostages has managed to escape and announced that the kidnappers had been native Russian speakers, he said.
In the letter sent by the separatists it is said that Georgia supports terrorism. Kakabadze (Minister of Special Affairs) doubts that the letter was written in Abkhazia and points at Russia.
`The event takes place exactly when Russian military base is to leave Akhalkalaki, the region settled with Armenians. Another Russian military base is to leave Gudauta, Abkhazia. Kists, so-called local Georgian Chechens, live in Pankisi. The war with Chechnya does not seem to have an end. If we sum everything up it will clearly appear that somebody, one identity, is involved in the process and it is ambitious about one definite thing`, states `the Resonance` and it clearly blames Russia.
According to experts, with the help of feeble law enforcement bodies and political threat and force Russia does its best to make Georgia fall into its clutches. `Russia supports destabilization but the interior policy of Georgia supports it also`, Davit Berdzenishvili, head of the Republican Party, told `the Resonance`.
As to the conditions existing in the Pankisi Valley, both the Georgian press and experts presume that the problem there has been created by Russians. `Russia makes its effort to pass anti-Chechen policy in Georgia… Tension of the situation in Pankisi serves Russian interests in the Caucasus. Gudauta, Batumi, and Akhalkalaki military bases as well as the problem of Abkhazia are to be viewed in similar context.
`The Resonance` tries to foresee future proceedings: `Experts say that Russia will cause disorders as a result of kidnapping and murdering cases as well as ethnic conflicts in every part of Georgia. Social background will be helpful also. And then it will be easy – Georgia will become more dependant on Russia`.