Georgia: Veteran Leader of Breakaway Abkhazia Dies

Former de facto Abkhaz President Vladislav Ardzinba, who led Abkhazia's post-Soviet campaign for independence from Tbilisi, died in a Moscow hospital on March 4.

Russia's Ministry of Emergency Situations flew the 65-year old Ardzinba to Moscow on February 26. Ardzinba, who suffered from cancer, was placed in Moscow's Central Clinical Hospital the same day, news agencies reported.

Elected chairman of Abkhazia's Supreme Soviet in 1990, Ardzinba, an Asia Minor specialist, was elected president of Abkhazia in 1994, after the conclusion of a two-year war with Tbilisi for control of the territory. He was reelected by direct vote in 1999.

Within Abkhazia, Ardzinba is honored as a George Washington-like figure who mobilized the Abkhaz to throw off centuries of rule by outsiders. Within Georgian-controlled territory, however, he is vilified for the expulsion of some 250,000 ethnic Georgians from Abkhazia during a gruesome 1992-1994 war between Tbilisi and Abkhaz separatists, an act that Tbilisi charges is ethnic cleansing.

In a televised address, de facto President Sergei Bagapsh, who replaced Ardzinba as the region's leader in 2005, called Ardzinba a national hero. Bagapsh will head the committee handling funeral details.