Curious Gorges

Wednesday, Mar. 14, 2002
Even before they arrive, the deployment of élite U.S. troops to Georgia is prompting some Chechen fighters to leave the Pankisi Gorge, Georgian officials claimed this week. However, just as swiftly, it has become evident that U.S. involvement has prompted another bout of shadowboxing between Georgia, Russia, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Chechen rebels. So far, the United Nations and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) remain unable to broker any kind of deal.

Gela Bezhuashvili, Georgia's deputy defense minister, said on 7 March that a "small group" of Chechen fighters had left hideouts in the Pankisi Gorge, Reuters reported. Bezhuashvili said he believed that all but a tiny fraction would follow them. There has been no independent confirmation.

Bezhuashvili claimed that the Chechen fighters had headed northward through the rugged Caucasus mountains and had re-entered Chechnya. However, Georgia's security minister, Valeri Khaburdzania, said that some Chechen and al-Qaeda fighters had moved westward — away from Chechnya — to hide in the Kodori Gorge. He asserted that they were now in territory controlled by the Abkhaz government. On 7 March, in talks that followed a flare-up of violence last year and border disputes this year, Tbilisi refused to withdraw 300 of its soldiers from the gorge.

Abkhaz First Deputy Prime Minister Raul Khazhimba acknowledged that a group of armed men had been seen in the Abkhaz section of the disputed gorge, according to Radio Free Europe/Radio Lilberty (RFE/RL). Khaburdzania had previously said Washington should not restrict its attention to the Pankisi Gorge, as, he averred, al-Qaeda forces were fleeing through Abkhazia. Khazhimba has not accused Georgia of spiriting foreign fighters into the area, as it did when Abkhaz troops clashed with guerrillas in October. However, the head of Abkhazia's security service was reported on Caucasus Press as asserting that Georgia was planning to kidnap U.N. employees in the Abkhaz capital, Sukhumi, to create a pretext to attack Abkhazia with the support of U.S. troops.

To dispel doubts about Washington's intentions, both Washington and Tbilisi have repeated the line that U.S. troops are in Georgia only to train four Georgian battalions, not to fight. According to reports cited by RFE/RL, Georgian Foreign Minister Irakli Menagharishvili also described the notion that Georgia might serve as a base for attacks on Iraq as being "from the realm of science fiction." In addition, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on 7 March that it has received assurances from Washington that U.S.-trained units would not become involved in Georgia's conflicts with Abkhazia and a second breakaway republic, South Ossetia.

There were no signs of progress toward persuading Georgia to pull back troops from the Kodori Gorge; Russia to honor a 1999 agreement to withdraw from two military bases in Georgia; or Abkhazia to contemplate some form of constitutional settlement within the framework of the Georgian state. Instead, on 2 March, Abkhazia held parliamentary elections that were boycotted by the opposition, not recognized by the U.N., and labeled by the OSCE as unhelpful given the U.N.'s peace efforts. The same weekend, the breakaway republic applied to become an "associate member" of the Russian Federation, according to Caucasus Press.

On 6 March, the question of Abkhazia's and South Ossetia's status was put to a vote in the Russian Duma. It overwhelmingly approved a resolution that it should acknowledge other "expressions of free choice" for the two republics if the peace talks fail. That suggests that the Duma might eventually push to change the constitution.

Some Georgian parliamentarians say they will press to recognize Chechnya's independence if Moscow recognizes Abkhazia and South Ossetia as separate states. Shevardnadze added his own voice on 4 March, saying that "if the State Duma guarantees some kind of independence or associate membership [to Abkhazia or South Ossetia], I believe that this will signal the beginning of Russia's own breakup." With that statement, Shevardnadze may also have been playing on a persistent Russian fear in the 1990s that, by granting independence to Chechnya, Moscow might then face similar challenges in other South Caucasian republics.

Whether these complex strands can be slowly unraveled or will become knottier may depend greatly on how Russian President Vladimir Putin and Shevardnadze handle domestic pressures. Putin faces the challenge of the Duma and Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov — both of them angry and disturbed at the inroads made by the United States in Central Asia and the Caucasus, areas that Russia has traditionally viewed as its sphere of influence. Shevardnadze faces substantially greater problems. There are more than 200,000 refugees from the 1992-1993 conflict with Abkhazia who are demanding the right to return to their homes and, if his peace representative is right, various groups that are determined to reintegrate Abkhazia. Moreover, his political standing has been reduced by the political crisis in November 2001, and the recent death — labeled a suicide — of the head of the Georgian Security Council, Nugzar Sajaia, has deprived him of a long-standing ally.

This article was edited and adapted from Transitions Online. A longer version is available at: www.tol.cz

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