From: MSN NicknameEagle_wng (Original Message) Sent: 3/4/2007 12:59 AM BBC NEWS Breakaway Abkhazia votes in poll By Matthew Collin BBC News, Abkhazia
People in Abkhazia, a Black Sea region trying to break away from Georgia since a 1990s war, are voting in parliamentary elections.
Georgia's government has vowed to re-assert control over the region.
Abkhazia is a key factor in the long-running political conflict between Georgia and Russia, which has expressed support for the separatists' ambitions.
None of the candidates in this election is proposing that Abkhazia should ever unite with Georgia again.
More than a decade after the war here, most people believe independence is their destiny.
The separatist Abkhaz authorities hope the vote will demonstrate the region has the potential to become an independent democratic state.
But the Georgian government insists Abkhazia is part of Georgia and these elections are not legitimate.
Boycott
Tensions have been high in the Gali region, which has a large ethnic Georgian population and where there have been reports of several violent disputes in recent months.
Abkhazia never will be Russian - they can just dream about that when they will sleep Ethnic Georgian in Gali
Gali still bears the scars of the war more than a decade ago. Some houses are abandoned while others lie derelict through poverty and neglect.
Around 250,000 people fled the fighting but some ethnic Georgians have since returned to Gali. Many of them say they will boycott this weekend's elections.
Like the Georgian government and the international community, they believe the polls are not legitimate because Abkhazia is legally part of Georgia.
Some Abkhaz separatists eventually want to join the Russian Federation but many ethnic Georgians reject this.
"Abkhazia never will be Russian. They can just dream about that when they will sleep," says one Gali resident.
Talks stalled
Russia has peacekeeping troops in the region and is supporting the Abkhaz separatists politically and economically.
But Georgia believes Moscow is manipulating the conflict to maintain its influence in the region.
More than a decade after the war, negotiations to end this conflict have stalled.
The results of this election are unlikely to bring a peace settlement any closer. Story from BBC NEWS: http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/europe/6416685.stm
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