Prime Minister of breakaway Abkhazia Nodar Khashba said, after holding separate talks with the two main Abkhaz presidential rivals Sergey Bagapsh and Raul Khajimba on November 15, that there are hopes of finding a solution to the current political crisis in the breakaway region.
“I am sure in the nearest days, or maybe even in the nearest hours, I will be able to convene both of them together to find out the only right, mutual solution to the current political crisis,” Itar-Tass news agency reported quoting Nodar Khashba as saying.
Meanwhile, reports say that the opposition activists who captured the governmental compounds on November 12 abandoned the administrative offices on Monday.
Regnum news agency reported on November 15, quoting Abkhaz Vice-President Valeri Arshba as saying that the Parliament, President’s Administration and the Governmental Office is currently under the Interior Ministry’s control.
However, Prime Minister Nodar Khashba and the Abkhaz cabinet members have not returned to their offices yet. According to the Regnum news agency Khashba is under heightened security in one of the governmental vacation homes outside Sokhumi.
Prime Minister Nodar Khashba also said that he is in full control of all the defense and security bodies of the unrecognized republic. However, added “there are some problems with the Sokhumi police.”
Chairman of the Abkhaz Parliament Nodar Ashuba told the RIA Novosti news agency that the parliamentarians, as well as the staff of the legislative body, are back in their offices.
“The Parliament is currently guarded by the Interior Ministry forces,” he added.
Tensions in the breakaway region heightened after November 12 when the opposition seized the governmental office. The unrest on November resulted in the death of a respected Abkhaz professor, Tamar Shakril.
The Chairman of the Abkhaz Parliament said that the legislative body “will continue the fulfillment of its duties in full only after the funeral of Tamar Shakril.”
Earlier in November opposition presidential candidate Sergey Bagapsh, who claims victory in the October 3 presidential polls, said that there were two ways to solve the dispute between him and Raul Khajimba: the first one – the Parliament’s decision or an all-Abkhaz gathering. The latter one turned into ‘mass disorder’ on November 12.
In the wake of the Abkhazian Supreme Court’s controversial ruling, outgoing Abkhaz President Vladislav Ardzinba issued an order on October 29 instructing the Central Election Commission to hold repeat presidential elections in the breakaway region within two months. But Sergey Bagapsh condemned Ardzinba’s order as “illegitimate.”