From: MSN NicknameEagle_wng (Original Message) Sent: 8/11/2007 2:53 AM Friday, August 10, 2007 New Tensions Arise Among Neighbors The Washington Post
On Monday, a missile crashed into the ground near a village in Georgia. The weapon failed to detonate, but the event has nevertheless sparked new tensions between the small, democratic country and Russia, its former overlord to the north.
Details are still emerging, but the Georgian government says radar records prove that a Russian Su-24 jet entered Georgian airspace from the northeast, dropped the missile and then returned home. Georgian officials also claim that the recovered weapon was a Russian anti-radar missile designed for use with the Su-24, an aircraft not in Georgia's arsenal.
There is speculation that the target was a nearby Georgian radar installation. Moscow has insisted that the Georgians attacked themselves -- a Kremlin defense that has become unsettlingly familiar and no more convincing. A U.S. official familiar with the case says the Georgians' evidence is credible and that there is no evidence to support the Russians' story.
The missile incident resembles in a disturbing way a March incident in which a missile was fired at a government building in Abkhazia, a small territory in northwestern Georgia that is home to pro-Russian rebels. Then, too, the evidence pointed to Russian aggression, but a United Nations report stopped short of blaming Russia -- probably because Moscow had to sign off on the document. type=text/javascript></SCRIPT> src="http://pagead2.googlesyndication.com/pagead/show_ads.js" type=text/javascript> </SCRIPT>
By violating Georgian sovereignty, the Kremlin may hope to bait Georgia into responding with force of its own near an already tense border.
Added conflict in the region could make Western governments nervous about Georgia's suitability to join NATO, membership being a key goal of pro-Western President Mikheil Saakashvili. So far, however, Georgia has wisely limited itself to releasing information and lodging diplomatic protests.
The United States and Europe should help Georgia bring the issue before the UN Security Council. And if, after a full vetting of the facts, it remains clear that the Russians are at fault, Georgia's aspirations for NATO membership should not be hampered. Indeed, stemming this sort of aggression is what NATO was set up to do.
This comment appeared as an editorial in The Washington Post.
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