Eurasia Insight:
WHITHER SAAKASHVILI'S REUNIFICATION EFFORTS IN GEORGIA?
Igor Torbakov: 5/17/04

With Ajaria now back under Tbilisi’s control, attention is turning to how Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili approaches Georgia’s two other separatist regions – Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Leaders in the two territories suspect that the Saakashvili administration is bent on using force in pursuit of its reconquista agenda. Georgia officials, however, insist that, like Ajaria, Abkhazia and South Ossetia will be brought back into Georgia’s fold using peaceful means.

Policy-makers in Russia are apprehensively monitoring developments in Georgia. For over a decade, Moscow often used its leverage in Abkhazia, Ajaria and South Ossetia to ensure Tbilisi’s general loyalty to Russian security interests in the Caucasus. Saakashvili’s rise to power and his ability to topple one of the Kremlin’s pawns – former Ajarian leader Aslan Abashidze – has caused a dramatic change in the political calculus governing Russian-Georgian relations. Russian officials and experts now worry that a strengthening central government in Tbilisi is causing Russia’s strategic position in the Caucasus to erode.

Abkhazia and South Ossetia have operated beyond Tbilisi’s control for more than a decade, securing de facto independence amid the inter-ethnic violence that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. Saakashvili has spoken openly and often about his desire to reunify the country. For example, during a May 7 pro-government rally in Ajaria marking Abashidze’s demise, Saakashvili said: "I’m sure that very soon we’ll go together to Abkhazia and will get [Georgia] completely united."

Abkhazian leaders are plainly concerned that Saakashvili seeks to apply his Rose Revolution formula – organizing mass rallies that force incumbent authority from power – to Abkhazia in the regional capital Sukhumi. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. The Civil Georgia web site reported May 17 that Abkhaz leaders have sent a letter to the head of the United Nations’ chief military observer, Kazi Ashfaq Ahmed, complaining that Georgian agents were attempting to fan popular unrest in some parts of the break-away republic, in particular the Gali District.

Abkhaz leaders have also accused Tbilisi of militarizing the Kodori Gorge, which could be used as a possible springboard for an attack into the Abkhaz heartland. [For additional information see the Eurasia Insight archive]. According to the Rustavi 2 television channel, Abkhaz forces have engaged in counter-measures, taking action to intimidate ethnic Georgians in the Gali District.

Georgia’s Chief of the General Staff Givi Iukuridze told Imedi TV on May 14 that Tbilisi is "doing everything possible so that this [Abkhazia] problem is resolved through political methods." At the same time, Iukuridze noted that popular rallies have occurred recently in Abkhazia calling for "the settlement of the conflict." Talks involving Georgian, Russian and Abkhaz representatives on a political deal have long been stalemated. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].

"These demands probably arouse the worst fears of Abkhazia’s self-declared authorities," Iukuridze said. "So they are doing their best not to lose control over events ... but I think that they will fail."

According to Civil Georgia, Georgian State Minister Goga Khaindrava is planning to travel on May 20 to Sukhumi for talks designed to reassure Abkhaz leaders. The web site added that Saakashvili’s administration has formulated a political plan in which Tbilisi and Sukhumi would coexist in a federal relationship. Details of the plan are being kept under wraps for the time being, Civil Georgia said.

Whether or not a federal arrangement would be sufficient to get Abkhaz leaders to agree to a political compromise is uncertain. For now Sukhumi is taking a tough line, insisting that the de facto independence gained during the 1992-93 civil war be recognized in some manner. Abkhazia’s self-declared foreign minister, Sergei Shamba, has accused Saakashvili of "arrogance." Meanwhile, the region’s self-styled defense minister, Viacheslav Eshba, bluntly stated recently that "the Georgian government’s attempt to export the Rose Revolution to Abkhazia -- as they have recently done in Ajaria -- will not succeed because Abkhazia is not a part of Georgia, but is an independent state."

Despite the defiant rhetoric, Abkhaz leaders have clearly been unnerved by Saakashvili’s success in Ajaria.

On May 6, the same day Abashidze departed for Russia, Abkhaz prime-minister Raul Khajimba flew to Moscow – reportedly to hold talks on Abkhazian-Georgian relations with the officials at the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The Moskovskii Komsomolets daily reported May 8 that Shamba urged Moscow to open a Russian peacekeepers’ post in the upper part of Kodori Gorge, on what is Georgian territory. Even if Russian officials wanted to do so, they appear to lack a viable pretext for such action, observers say. Current conditions in the gorge are relatively calm, so Russia could not characterize such action as a stabilization move.

South Ossetia’s leaders are also evidently worried about Tbilisi’s reunification efforts. The speaker of South Ossetian parliament, Stanislav Kochiyev, told the Vremia Novostei daily that the Georgian leadership’s efforts to restore the country’s territorial integrity might ultimately lead "to any moves, including forceful ones."

Many Russian experts believe that Tbilisi considers the recent events in Ajaria as a "test case." At the same time, Russian observers tend to feel that Ajaria does not create a precedent for the solution of the Abkhaz and South Ossetian questions. Konstantin Zatulin, the director of the Institute for CIS Studies, argued that inter-ethnic differences will prevent Tbilisi from using "its Ajarian experience in other regions of the country." Zatulin pointed out that, unlike the residents of Ajaria, Abkhaz and Ossetians are ethnically distinct from Georgians. Zatulin and other also said Russia’s ties to Abkhazia and South Ossetia are much stronger than those that bound Moscow to Batumi.

"Abkhazia enjoys direct Russian support; there are many Russian citizens there, and it would be very problematic [for Georgian central government] to carry out a direct military incursion there," a commentary published by Moskovskii Komsomolets said.

In recent days, Georgian officials have toned down their reunification rhetoric. During talks with Russian officials May 7-8, Georgian Foreign Minister Salome Zurabishvili stressed that "there is no connection between Ajaria and Abkhazia." Saakashvili himself has tempered expectations for a quick resolution of the Abkhaz question. "It will take a couple of years," he said. "We need to negotiate to create some kind of federal arrangement, plus give them economic incentives."

The Georgian president indicated that it could prove easier to reintegrate South Ossetia than Abkhazia. "Ossetia will take place sooner than that [Abkhazia’s reintegration]," Saakashvili said.

Editor’s Note: Igor Torbakov is a freelance journalist and researcher who specializes in CIS political affairs. He holds an MA in History from Moscow State University and a PhD from the Ukrainian Academy of Sciences. He was Research Scholar at the Institute of Russian History, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow; a Visiting Scholar at the Kennan Institute, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, Washington DC; a Fulbright Scholar at Columbia University, New York; and a Visiting Fellow at Harvard University. He is now based in Istanbul, Turkey.