Ambassador Dieter Boden, who served from 1999-2002 as the UN
secretary-general's special representative for the Abkhaz conflict,
returned
to Sukhumi this week after a seven-year hiatus for talks with Abkhaz
leaders, including Sergei Bagapsh, the breakaway Georgian region's de
facto president. He will travel to Tbilisi on March 17. EU special
representative for the South Caucasus Peter Semneby was scheduled to
arrive in Abkhazia on March 11.
Boden is quoted as having
argued during his meetings in Sukhumi that it is in Abkhazia's interest
to continue participating in the talks in Geneva on security and
stability in the breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia in the
wake of the August 2008 war between Georgia and Russia that
precipitated their formal recognition by Moscow as independent states.
Those talks
bring together at the negotiating table
under the joint aegis of the United Nations, the Organization for
Security and Cooperation in Europe, and the European Union
representatives from Georgia, Russia, the United States, Abkhazia, and
South Ossetia.
Boden acknowledged that the Geneva talks have
yielded little progress to date. The most recent, ninth round took
place in late January; the next is scheduled for March 30.
The
Abkhaz and South Ossetian representatives, backed by Russia, want
Georgia to sign a formal binding pledge not to resort to military
forces against them. Georgia for its part is ready to sign such a pact
only with Russia, and only after the Russian troops currently stationed
in the two breakaway regions are withdrawn. The international community
is likewise pushing for a Russian pullout, to be followed by the
deployment of an international peacekeeping force.
Maksim
Gvinjia, a member of the Abkhaz delegation to the January talks who has
since been named foreign minister to succeed Sergei Shamba, argues that
the signing of a binding agreement on the nonuse of force is an
absolute
priority and should not be made contingent on any other issue.
Boden
said that in creating a legal basis for relations between the two sides
it is "important to take into account agreements signed earlier." It is
not clear which specific agreements he meant. Abkhazia rejected
outright not only Boden's own blueprint for resolving the conflict in
such a way as to preserve Georgia's territorial integrity -- the "Basic
Principles for the Distribution of Constitutional Competencies" -- but
also successive proposals by Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili in
2004 and 2005. Georgia for its part rejected a
counterproposal unveiled by Bagapsh in May 2006.
Boden described the most recent Georgian peace plan, the "
State Strategy On Occupied Territories,"
as containing "interesting observations" as well as some "unacceptable
formulations." He did not elaborate, but it is likely that the very
term "occupied territories" gave rise to anger and resentment in both
regions, insofar as it implicitly denies that the local populations
have any say whatsoever over how, and by whom, they are governed.
Boden's stay in Abkhazia coincides with the
arrival
in Sukhumi of EU special envoy Semneby. It is not known whether the two
men will meet informally and exchange impressions and notes, but it
would be logical for them to do so.
The Abkhaz leadership has repeatedly
stressed its desire for the maximum possible engagement with the European Union. A
report
on the situation in Abkhazia released late last month by the
International Crisis Group (ICG) noted that the EU in turn "is
interested in finding ways to do more to support Georgian-Abkhazian
contacts." Semneby travelled to Abkhazia at least four times last year,
in February, March, April, and July.
According to the ICG
report, the EU's Political and Security Committee agreed in December on
unspecified "parameters for carving out a political and legal space
within which the EU can interact with Abkhazia and South Ossetia" and
thus contribute to the process of conflict resolution, without giving
the impression that it formally recognizes them as independent states.
http://www.rferl.org/content/Former_UN_Mediator_EU_Special_Representative_Visit_Abkhazia/1982237.html
