Latest Articles about South Caucasus
MOSCOW UNLEASHES A MOUNTAIN CHIEFTAIN AGAINST GEORGIA
Russian authorities, having recently co-opted Kodori Gorge chieftain Emzar Kvitsiani, are now unleashing him against Georgia. The Georgian free mass media as well as Russia’s unfree ones are amply disseminating his message. Televised reports show him flanked by armed men in uniform, some of them... MORE
AZERBAIJAN IS GROWING RAPIDLY, THANKS TO ITS OIL
The July 13 opening ceremony of the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline marked the beginning a new era in the history of Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Turkey. Azerbaijan is already begun to collect dividends from its oil sales, as reflected in a recent public announcement by Azerbaijani officials on... MORE
MOSCOW’S ANTI-GEORGIAN AGITPROP TARGETS WASHINGTON
Responding to Georgia’s call for the replacement of Russian “peacekeeping” troops by international police (see EDM, July 20), Moscow now accuses Georgia of a premeditated intent to launch military operations in South Ossetia and/or Abkhazia. Moreover, Russia threatens to intervene with its troops on the... MORE
BAKU’S CHAOTIC CONSTRUCTION BOOM DRAWS INCREASING CRITICISM
In recent weeks, more and more political parties, members of the intelligentsia, and media outlets have begun to criticize the haphazard, chaotic construction boom in Azerbaijan’s capital city, Baku. Increasing oil revenues and the growing demand for new apartments have turned the city into a... MORE
GEORGIAN PARLIAMENT CALLS FOR REPLACING RUSSIAN PEACEKEEPERS WITH INTERNATIONAL POLICE CONTINGENT
Georgia’s parliament approved on July 18 a resolution calling for the withdrawal of Russia’s “peacekeeping” troops from Georgian territory in Abkhazia and South Ossetia and the deployment of internationally mandated police forces in the two areas. The resolution’s preamble notes that Russia’s actions in blocking... MORE
DEZINFORMATSIYA ALIVE BUT TRANSPARENT
Two forgeries now circulating in Europe and North America bear the classic imprint of Soviet disinformation, presented, however, in modern-looking packaging developed by Modest Kolerov’s department of the presidential administration in the Kremlin. One of these forgeries attempts to portray Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili as... MORE
GEORGIAN PARLIAMENT SHOWS RUSSIAN PEACEKEEPERS THE DOOR, BUT QUESTIONS REMAIN
On Tuesday, July 18, the Georgian parliament passed a resolution calling for the withdrawal of Russian peacekeepers from South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The resolution, adopted overwhelmingly amid harsh anti-Russian rhetoric, declares that Russia’s so-called peacekeeping operation itself poses a major obstacle to a political settlement... MORE
DEVELOPMENT AID CAN BE GEARED TOWARD CONFLICT RESOLUTION IN ABKHAZIA
Georgia is preparing to exercise its sovereign right to demand the termination of Russian “peacekeeping” operations on its territory and their replacement with genuine international peacekeeping missions. Concurrently, Tbilisi is redoubling efforts to unfreeze not the conflicts as such (these are not and never were... MORE
FSB CLAIMS GEORGIA PLANNING “PROVOCATION” DURING G-8 MEETING
On July 9 Oleg Alborov, secretary of South Ossetia’s security council, was killed by a remote-controlled bomb as he opened his garage door. Officials in the breakaway Georgian republic immediately accused the Georgian special services of carrying out this assassination. As the simmering conflict between... MORE
GEORGIAN COURTS, MEDIA, CRITICIZED FOR UNPOPULAR DECISIONS
As top Georgian leaders conducted diplomatic trips abroad, the domestic political situation at home heated up. President Mikheil Saakashvili returned from his July 3-6 visit to the United States with declarations of support from the Bush administration. Parliamentary Chair Nino Burjanadze was not as fortunate,... MORE