IASPS - News Behind the News

October 20, 2002

A Test Ground of Puti‎n’s Internati‎onal Conduct

Georgian authorities have just completed successfully a nonviolent security operation in the Pankisi Gorge, the suspected haven of a handful of Chechen fighters. Lawless and crime-ridden no more, the gorge is now controlled by Georgian forces, and open to Russian and international inspection. Moscow had threatened to extend the war from Chechnya into Georgia under anti-terrorism pretenses, the real goal being however to change Georgia's Western orientation. President Vladimir Putin and his closest associates were publicly hinting that a free hand in Georgia was part of Russia's price for standing aside if the United States moves against Saddam Hussein in Iraq.

The threats to Georgia had become a significant irritant to American-Russian relations, also jeopardizing Western interests regarding the transit of Caspian oil and gas. Therefore, the peaceful restoration of order in Pankisi-and, indeed, any move to consolidate the Georgian state-is good news also in terms of Western direct access to Caspian energy, as well as for U.S.-led efforts against international terrorism and related mass-destruction-weapons threats.

Moscow's fixation on the Pankisi problem has for some time distracted international attention from its more far-reaching moves to thwart Georgia's Western course. Now is the time to refocus political attention on those larger, festering problems, which affect not only Georgia, but the post-Soviet international order, the credibility of international organizations, and Russia's own prospects to develop democratically.

Those unresolved issues include: Russian troops and bases, peacekeeping and "ethnic" conflict resolution, adherence to international obligations, and decolonization of the South Caucasus-Caspian region. Russia maintains three Soviet-era military bases in Georgia, totaling some 8,000 troops and large arsenals, without a legal basis and against Georgia's oft-expressed will. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe at its 1999 summit required Russia to close down the Gudauta base by July 2001, and to negotiate with Georgia regarding the Batumi and Akhalkalaki bases. All of the OSCE member countries including Russia subscribed to those summit decisions.

Nevertheless, Russia retains the Gudauta base to this day, and is blocking OSCE inspections there, although such inspections are mandatory under the Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe. Meanwhile, Moscow demands an eleven-year extension for the Batumi and Akhalkalaki bases, and has unilaterally suspended the OSCE-mandated negotiations with Georgia. On the other hand, Moscow has said that it wants Western money to defray at least some of the costs of relocating the troops from Georgia to Russia. Western countries should give this idea urgent favorable consideration.

Subsidizing the Russian troop withdrawal worked well for Germany and the Baltic states during the 1990s. In Georgia it would cost far less, compared to those earlier cases which involved much larger Russian forces. Georgia's independence and role as energy transit corridor is worth infinitely more than the cost of relocating those troops to Russia. For now, those troops' presence fosters disorder and armed ethnic separatism. In the secessionist Abkhazia, a political and humanitarian problem of massive ethnic cleansing of Georgians stands, unresolved and practically unaddressed, before the international community. Russian military intervention created this problem in the first place.

This year, Russia conferred its citizenship on the residents of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, areas universally considered (by Russia as well, officially) to form integral parts of Georgia. The Russian Duma has passed legislation that, on paper at least, authorizes the "admission" of other states or parts of other states into the Russian Federation as its constituent units. Most recently, Russian ministerial delegations to Abkhazia have discussed the acquisition of what is legally Georgian state property by Russian entities. Is it not high time to ask Mr. Putin whether, in his view, international law still applies to Russia-Georgia relations?

In Abkhazia and South Ossetia (as in Moldova's Transnistria region), Moscow seeks acceptance of an exclusive role as the military "peacekeeper" in post-Soviet areas. In parallel, it insists on a leading role as diplomatic mediator in the local conflicts that it had itself sparked and continues to exploit. Fortunately, Russia has not obtained any international recognition of that special role, though it enjoys a degree of acceptance de facto. Any formalized acceptance, or prolonged tacit tolerance, would create regional spheres of Russian influence rooted in the Soviet past. It was in Abkhazia in the early 1990s that Shamil Basaev, Ruslan Gelaev, and many hundreds of Chechen fighters first gained combat experience. They were armed, trained and deployed by the Russian military in the war against Georgia. They were not being labeled "terrorists" by Moscow then.

Even today, Moscow harbors Igor Giorgadze, the suspected organizer of the 1995 assassination attempt on President Eduard Shevardnadze. Mr. Giorgadze is wanted ever since in Georgia for legal proceedings. Russian media-including Kremlin-controlled state television-regularly interview Mr. Giorgadze, even as Russia's intelligence agencies- Mr. Putin's home base- pretend to be unaware of Igor Giorgadze's whereabouts. The post-September 11 international political consensus on the issue of terrorism has evidently not impinged on Mr. Giorgadze's safe haven.
Russia's media have, under Mr. Putin, lost a good deal of the freedom they had enjoyed previously. The authorities now control or influence much of the media output.

Officially-inspired coverage of Georgia and of Russia-Georgia relations is designed to excuse the Russian military's setbacks in the Chechnya war, back up the threats of force against Georgia, generate anti-Georgian sentiment among the Russian public and prepare the political atmosphere for military actions on Georgian territory. Such misuse of the media illustrates the truism that neo-imperial ambitions are destructive of democracy at home. The crisis over Pankisi lasted for almost two years. American political support shielded Georgia from possible Russian military intervention, while the U.S. Train-and-Equip Program is enabling Georgia's internal security forces to stabilize the country. When the United States first announced that program in February of this year, Mr. Putin decided-as he had last year in Central Asia-not to stand in the way. Since then, however, he and his close associates have sought to create pretexts for military intervention in Georgia, without that country's or international consent.

With major Western economic interests at stake here, Georgia should be regarded as a touchstone of Mr. Putin's willingness to accept the post-Soviet countries' independence and their choice of a Western orientation. Georgia is also the place where the Kremlin can show whether it supports U.S.-led anti-terrorism efforts as a matter of principle, or would only exploit this issue and seek country-for-country tradeoffs. In sum, Georgia is a testing ground of Mr. Putin's international conduct.

The above article appeared in The Wall Street Journal Europe, October 18-20, 2002.

Mr. Socor is a senior fellow of the Washington-based Institute for Advanced Strategic and Political Studies.