Monsters&Critics:Georgia Parliament To Decide On Russian Peacekeeping Withdrawal
posted by FerrasB on February, 2006 as Imperialism
From Monsters and Critics.com
Europe News Georgian parliament to decide on Russian peacekeeping withdrawal By RIAN Feb 13, 2006, 19:00 GMT
Georgia's parliament is scheduled to gather on Monday to draft a resolution that is likely to recommend expelling Russian peacekeepers from the self-proclaimed republic of South Ossetia, the parliament's pubic relations office said.
Two parliamentary committees - on security and international relations - are set to meet together to hear reports by Defense Minister Irakly Okruashvili and Minister for Separatist Conflicts Georgy Haindrava. Prime Minister Zurab Nogaideli and Foreign Minister Gela Bezhuashvili will also attend.
The committees will draft a document that is expected to set provisional dates for the withdrawal of Russia's peacekeepers from the central Tskhinval Region in the unrecognized republic. The document is set to be debated and put to a parliamentary vote on February 15.
Tbilisi has repeatedly accused Moscow of siding with separatists in Georgia's breakaway provinces. The chairmen of both committees have repeatedly said that the current structure of peacekeepers involving Georgia's battalion, and peacekeepers from Russia and South Ossetia, bars the way to achieving a political settlement.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said earlier it was concerned about Georgia's intention to expel peacekeepers from South Ossetia. Andrei Kelin, the director of the Russian Foreign Ministry's department of CIS affairs, said: 'Moscow is seriously concerned about the Georgian parliament's intention to expel Russian peacekeepers from South Ossetia.'
Kelin, who recently held consultations on bilateral relations with Khaindrava and Timur Alazaniya, a Georgian presidential aide on political issues, said: 'The reasons [for the expulsion] that the Georgian officials voiced during the two-day consultations are unconvincing.'
'There is a mixture of misunderstanding on several aspects of bilateral relations and the erroneous opinion of the Georgian side that Russia has rejected a plan proposed by Tbilisi on the peaceful resolution of the conflict in South Ossetia,' the diplomat said.
The consultations occurred against the backdrop of a recent string of events that raised tensions between Georgian and Russian peacekeepers. A road accident on February 1 involving a convoy of Russian peacekeepers and a car owned by a Georgian driver led to hundreds of armed Georgian policemen and soldiers swarming the scene and seizing the Russian truck until compensation had been paid. Three Russian officers were reported last week after they arrived in the area to investigate the incident. The Georgian authorities said they had arrived in the country without visas, though the Russian delegation disputed the need for them.
Russian troops are stationed in the zone of the conflict between Georgia and South Ossetia, which erupted in the early 1990s, as part of the Joint Collective Peacekeeping Forces.
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