Sukhumi Rejects Georgia’s Proposal to Monitor Gudauta Base

(Tbilisi, July 24, 2003, Civil Georgia) – Russian media sources report quoting de facto Prime Minister of Abkhazia Raul Khajimba that the Abkhaz side is against the arrival of Georgian military experts in Abkhazia to monitor the Russian military base in Gudauta.

Spokesman of the Russian Foreign Ministry Alexander Yakovenko said earlier the Russia is ready to allow Georgian and international monitoring groups to observe the Gudauta military base.

Georgia demands from Russia to disband the base in Gudauta as required by t!
he agreement reached in 1999 at the OSCE Istanbul summit, while the Russian side claims that it has already pulled out military hardware and the base is used at the moment by the Russian peacekeepers in Abkhazia as a recreation center.

“Russian base is dislocated on the territory of Abkhazia and the Georgian experts can not monitor it without a sanction of the Abkhaz authorities,” de facto Prime Minister said at the news briefing in Sukhumi on July 24.