Steady State

New proposal to resolve Abkhaz conflict?

March 29th, 2008 by jibs

Georgia’s president Mikheil Saakashvili unveiled a set of new proposals to resolve the protracted conflict with Abkhazia.

• Joint free economic zone in Gali and Ochamchire (regions in Abkhazia);
• Abkhaz representation in the Georgian central authorities;
• the post of Vice-President;
• the right to veto decisions related with Abkhazia;
• Gradual merger of law enforcement agencies.

As interesting these proposals might be, it is highly unlikely that they will go beyond the concept level — at least in the short run. The Abkhaz side quickly rejected this plan, calling it a PR stunt to impress the NATO members ahead of the crucial Bucharest summit, where Georgia hopes to get an official invitation to join the NATO alliance:

It is impossible having undeclared war against Abkhazia yesterday, involving terrorists acts and today becoming a peace-loving politician. [] We have already passed through it,” Bagapsh [Abkhazia’s de facto president] said. “We had autonomy, on the eve of the war, in the early nineties. We offered federation with Georgia, but received an armed invasion…

It is hard to achieve a compromise with the Abkhaz side, which has been consistently demanding official recognition from Tbilisi as a precondition to any sort of breakthrough in relations.

Had Saakashvili put this plan on the table 5 years ago, there might have been something to talk about. Unfortunately, his first term as Georgia’s president has been accompanied with sabre rattling towards the Abkhaz side and stalled negotiation process for over two years. It is therefore, more than optimistic to expect that Abkhaz side would embrace this plan.

This is of course not to shift blame on the Georgian side — far from it. It is just reality on the ground that events of negative nature have prevailed in the Abkhaz-Georgian relations over the last five years. Even more, there have been practically no positive moments which would give reason to be optimistic (if of course one doesn’t count successful handover of captured saboteurs).

For any improvement in the Georgian-Abkhaz relations, it is crucial that regular border incidents stop — regardless of who is behind those acts. It is also crucial to have normalized relations with Russia, who holds the key to the conflict resolution. And more importantly, the Abkhaz side also needs to be certain of Tbilisi’s benign intentions, but, at the moment such this is simply not there.

Bookmark to: