Georgia: Tbilisi Charges Moscow with "Piracy"

Georgia is condemning Russia's plans to send three patrol boats to guard maritime traffic off southern Abkhazia's Black Sea coast.

The Georgian Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a December 6 statement that international law does not recognize that Abkhazia has territorial waters and that the presence of Russian boats can therefore be qualified as "piracy." Russia, Venezuela and Nicaragua to date have recognized Abkhazia as an independent country from Georgia.

"The arrival of Russian border boats will provide security for the vessels headed to Abkhaz ports and will guard the republic's sea borders," Interfax as saying Oleg Frolov, deputy border control chief of Russia's Federal Security Service, as saying on December 4. Seeking to put pressure on the breakaway region, Georgia in the past has detained several foreign commercial ships carrying goods to and from Abkhazia.