| Yuri Luzhkov decided to respond to Mikheil Saakashvili with action Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov made his contribution to the aggravation of the already sharply complicated Russian-Georgian relations recently. The capital's mayor spent the entire day yesterday in sunny Abkhazia - as he claims, on an unofficial, non-political, purely business visit. The Moscow mayor arrived in Abkhazia in the morning and returned home in the evening. Together with the Moscow mayor, State Duma deputy Konstantin Zatulin and President of the Republic of Adygea Khazret Sovmen visited Abkhazia.
Yuri Luzhkov's visit to Abkhazia looked like a direct response to Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, who the day before promised to sink all Russian ships approaching Abkhazia without the consent of the Georgian side. True, Mr. Luzhkov arrived in Abkhazia not by sea, but by the usual road for all vacationers - along the highway from Sochi airport, bypassing the checkpoint on the Abkhaz section of the Russian state border with Georgia.
The distinguished guests, apparently, had a good time. They managed to take a tour of the cave in New Athos, visited a monastery located in the same resort village, and visited Cape Pitsunda and Gagra. In addition to the Abkhaz leaders, Yuri Luzhkov, Khazret Sovmen and Konstantin Zatulin met with numerous vacationers from Russia.
At the same time, the Moscow mayor behaved quite in the style of the Georgian president. Stating that the Moscow government is going to restore the Moscow sanatorium in Gagra and open a camp in Abkhazia for Moscow children, Mr. Luzhkov noted: “Abkhazia is a country in which it is calm and stable.” By calling Abkhazia a “country,” despite all the statements about the unofficial nature of the visit, the Moscow mayor actually provoked the wrath of official Tbilisi.
However, Mr. Luzhkov was not alone in the “elegance” of his diplomatic exercises - the Russian Duma provided worthy competition to the Moscow mayor. The statement “On the situation in the Caucasus” adopted yesterday by the lower house of parliament states that the actions of the Georgian side, which is trying to unilaterally resolve the Georgian-South Ossetian and Georgian-Abkhaz conflict in its favor, “will be regarded as a hostile act with all the ensuing consequences.” . And then Russian parliamentarians did not come up with anything better than to remind their Georgian comrades that independent Georgia used to be an integral part of the Soviet Union. In their opinion, “the conflict on the territory of the former Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic is rapidly moving towards a large-scale military confrontation in the Caucasus.” The deputies asked the President and the Russian government to “take all necessary adequate measures to normalize the situation in the conflict zone, promote political dialogue between the conflicting parties and ensure the safety of Russian citizens, vehicles and other property.”
According to the press service of the capital's mayor, the purpose of yesterday's trip was issues of "trade and economic relations", which Yuri Luzhkov discussed with the Vice President of Abkhazia Valery Arshba and the head of government Raul Khadzhimba (who has already announced that he will run for president of the unrecognized republic on October 3 ). The Moscow mayor showed interest in the supply of agricultural products from the republic and talked a lot about the possibility of opening a trading house within the Garden Ring in Moscow, where deals would be concluded for the wholesale supply of goods from Abkhazia. Mr. Luzhkov also spoke in favor of attracting Russian investment in the development of coal, the restoration of chemical industry enterprises, in particular the chemical plant in Sukhumi, the organization of a plastics production plant and in the resort sector.
Moscow has more than once presented significant gifts to residents of Abkhazia, including those who have Russian passports and, accordingly, Russian citizenship (more than 90% of these in Abkhazia). Judging by Mr. Luzhkov's statements, Muscovites will not abandon the residents of the republic in a difficult situation. Moreover, they will be provided not only with buses and trolleybuses (last year, ten buses and two trolleybuses were sent from Moscow to the Abkhaz capital Sukhumi), bitumen and road repair machines, but they will also extend compulsory medical insurance programs for veterans of the Great Patriotic War to Russian citizens living in Abkhazia. All of the above benefits are included in a special agreement, which will be signed in the near future between the Moscow government and the leadership of the Republic of Abkhazia.
Therefore, it is not surprising that Tbilisi greeted Yuri Luzhkov’s trip with hostility. Prime Minister of Georgia Zurab Zhvania, speaking at a briefing, recalled that any privatization act concluded in Abkhazia must comply with Georgian laws, and advised the Moscow mayor and Russian entrepreneurs not to look at Abkhaz health resorts and not “throw money away.”
Georgian State Minister for Conflict Resolution Georgiy Khaindrava, in turn, outlined his version of the “completely incomprehensible” visit of the Moscow mayor, linking it with the restoration of the Abkhaz section of the Sochi-Sukhumi railway. The State Minister believes that its restoration without the parallel return of Georgian refugees to the Gali region of Abkhazia contradicts last year’s agreements between Vladimir Putin and Eduard Shevardnadze. According to him, “there are Sochi agreements between the presidents of Georgia and Russia and joint working groups created within the framework of the agreements reached.” “However, there are no agreements between the working groups to begin restoration work on the Sochi-Sukhumi railway section,” he notes. The Georgian Foreign Ministry told Vremya Novostei that by recently starting these restoration works, the Russian side “grossly violated previously reached agreements and the principles of international law.” But the Russian Foreign Ministry explained that the need for repair work, in which Russian specialists are involved, is related to ongoing measures to maintain the railway track in working condition after the launch of an electric train on the Sochi-Sukhumi route in December 2002.
As for another Russian visitor, Chairman of the State Duma Committee on CIS Affairs and Relations with Compatriots Andrei Kokoshin, who came under fire in South Ossetia on Wednesday, the head of the OSCE mission to Georgia, Roy Reeve, told reporters that he had sent his representative to Tskhinvali to understand the details of the incident . Igor GLANIN, Sochi, Mikhail VIGNANSKY, Tbilisi |
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