| Today, Russian Ambassador to Georgia Vyacheslav Kovalenko will present his credentials to President Mikheil Saakashvili. The diplomat was sent to work in Tbilisi in July 2006, but at the end of September, due to a sharp deterioration in bilateral relations, he was recalled to Moscow. Mr. Kovalenko returned to Tbilisi on January 23, yesterday he met with Georgian Foreign Minister Gela Bezhuashvili. “We need to solve the problems that cloud our relations,” the ambassador said. The next stage in the normalization of relations may be the resumption of direct flights, interrupted in early October. Negotiations on this issue will be held in Moscow on February 5-6. The issue of resuming the issuance of Russian visas to Georgian citizens was not discussed at the meeting between Kovalenko and Bezhuashvili. A source at the Russian Embassy told VN that the resumption of the ambassador’s work could have a positive impact on the fate of the captain of the Russian seiner Sergei Rybkin, who was arrested in mid-January for fishing off the coast of Abkhazia. The captain is serving a two-month pre-trial detention and faces up to five years in prison. Mikhail VIGNANSKY, Tbilisi
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