GEORGIA’S

President Eduard Shevardnadze fired all but three of his cabinet and named his ambassador to Russia, the 49-year-old Vazha Lortkipanidze, prime minister. Nationalists regard Lortkipanidze as pro-Russian and no doubt will attack him when he goes before the parliament for confirmation. Lortkipanidze himself says he serves Georgia’s interests but does not see those clashing with Russia’s. … No Georgian can contemplate relations with Russia without mixed feelings. Georgia borders on the most volatile regions of the Russian Caucasus: Chechnya, Dagestan, Ingushetia, and North Ossetia. If Russia fails to contain violence in those ethnic and Islamic republics, a spillover into mostly Christian Georgia seems inevitable. In any case Georgia is powerless to expel from its territory Russian “peacekeeping” troops, which both promote and control separatist movements in the north Georgia regions of Abkhazia, Ajaria, and South Ossetia. No solution to those conflicts is possible without Russian participation.