Russia edges toward Georgia exit
Posted on Wednesday, August 20, 2008
POTI, Georgia — Russia took the first steps toward a troop pullback from Georgia on Tuesday but at the same time paraded blindfolded and bound Georgian prisoners on armored vehicles and seized four U. S. humvees.
The moves came as NATO allies met in emergency session in Belgium and demanded that Russia fulfill its promise to withdraw its forces from the small former Soviet republic.
A small Russian column including three tanks, three trucks, five armored personnel carriers and a rocket-launcher left Gori, the central city that straddles a vital east-west highway. A Russian officer said they were headed for South Ossetia, the disputed province at the heart of the conflict, then home to Russia.
Meanwhile, however, a Russian engineering platoon was building reinforced trenches for a checkpoint just north of Gori, suggesting that Russian forces expect to be in Georgian territory for some time.
Elsewhere, Russian trucks and armored vehicles carried about 20 Georgian men, blindfolded, handcuffed and held at gunpoint.
They were taken from the western city of Poti to the nearby Russian-controlled military base in Senaki, according to Poti’s mayor, who said he had been told that they would be released today.
Mayor Vano Taginadze said the men, Georgian military and police troops, had been taken captive because the Georgians refused to let Russian armored vehicles into the port of Poti, along Georgia’s Black Sea coast.
A Georgian defense spokesman said eight servicemen detained while trying to guard the port were among those held.
Also in Poti, Russian soldiers commandeered four humvees that had been used in U. S.-Georgian military exercises and were destined to be shipped back to the United States.
The Pentagon said it was looking into the matter. Georgian Deputy Defense Minister Batu Kutelia said Russian forces seized the vehicles.
Col. Gen. Anatoly Nogovitsyn, deputy chief of the Russian General Staff, said Russia would claim whatever Georgian armaments it considered useful.
“We will not leave a single barrel, a single cartridge for Georgia which initiated this bloodshed,” he said, in an interview with Interfax-AVN. “Part of these arsenals, especially ammunition, will be destroyed and are already being destroyed, and as for the rest of the war trophies, we will use them as we please, in particular will take for ourselves part of the tanks and other armored vehicles that are in good condition.” Russian forces in Poti also blocked access to the city’s naval and commercial ports Tuesday morning and towed the missile boat Dioskuria, one of the navy’s most sophisticated vessels, out of sight of observers. An explosion was heard minutes later, and a Georgian interior spokesman said the Russians had blown up the boat.
Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili said Russia was not only flouting its withdrawal commitment but that its forces were “not losing time” in damaging Georgia by destroying infrastructure.
“Right now there are Russian soldiers and tanks at Poti,” Georgian Finance Minister Nika Gilavri said. “They want to open every single container” and inspect them. PRISONER EXCHANGE Georgian television showed footage of a tense standoff at a military training base in northwestern Georgia, where Russian troops tried to enter but were turned away by Georgia police. There was no violence, but the report said the Russians threatened to return and destroy the base if they were not allowed in. The two nations did exchange 20 prisoners of war — 15 Georgians and five Russians, according to the head of Georgia’s Security Council — to reduce tensions. The hostilities began earlier this month. Georgia cracked down on South Ossetia, which is internationally recognized as within Georgian borders but tilts toward Moscow and has expressed its independence, and Russia answered by sending its troops and tanks across the Georgian border. A cease-fire signed by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Saakashvili calls for Russian forces to pull back to the positions they held before Aug. 7. The Kremlin said Medvedev told French President Nicolas Sarkozy by phone Tuesday that Russian troops would withdraw from most of Georgia by Friday — some to Russia, others to South Ossetia and a surrounding “security zone” set in 1999. Backed by the United States and European powers, Georgia pleaded Tuesday for the U. N. Security Council to demand that Russia immediately withdraw its troops from its small neighbor. Russia, which is one of five members with veto power on the Security Council, said it could not support the measure because it did not contain all of the provisions of the European Union-backed cease-fire. The meeting adjourned without any action on the resolution.
GENOCIDE CLAIMS In Washington, a U. S. official dismissed as ridiculous claims by Russia that Georgia committed genocide during fighting this month. Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Matthew Bryza also demanded Russian action to end human-rights violations in areas of Georgia occupied by its troops.
Russian prosecutors have opened a genocide investigation into Georgian treatment of South Ossetians. Georgia sued Russia in international court, alleging murder, rape and mass expulsions of Georgians in South Ossetia and in a second Russianbacked separatist region, Abkhazia.
Bryza called reports of human-rights violations, including murder and rape, credible in areas of Georgia now controlled by Russia but said they appeared to be committed by Russian-backed irregular militias rather than the Russian military.
He said there was no credible evidence that Georgia had tried to wipe out civilian populations in the two regions.
“The claims of genocide or of ending the South Ossetian and Abkhaz people, they are downright false and ridiculous,” Bryza said.
RELIEF SUPPLIES More American C-130 transport planes ferried in tons of relief supplies for the tens of thousands displaced by the conflict, and the U. S. said it would help for as long as needed. U. S. Army Brig. Gen. Jon Miller said he was told that food is the major issue for people west of the Georgian capital, Tbilisi, because only sporadic convoys carrying rations had been able to get through. Georgian government officials said Russian checkpoints had made it difficult to get supplies into some areas, including Poti. In Moscow, a high-ranking security official said Tuesday that he had received intelligence about Georgian-planned terrorist attacks on Russian soil.
The official, Alexander Bortnikov, the Federal Security Service chief, said he had ordered tightened security at transportation hubs, industrial facilities and densely populated areas in Russia’s southernmost district, whose border stretches from Ukraine, through Georgia and as far as Kazakhstan, Interfax reported.
Tensions also flared between Russia and another former Soviet republic seeking NATO membership, Ukraine.
The two countries sparred over Russia’s use of a naval base in the port of Sevastopol, which it is renting from Ukraine. The Kremlin wants the Russian ships to remain in Sevastopol even when the current lease expires in 2017.
Ukraine’s pro-Western President, Viktor Yushchenko, sided with Georgia in its conflict with Russia and moved to restrict the movement of Russian ships in the port. Ukraine’s foreign minister later said Ukraine would not physically prevent Russian ships from entering and leaving the base. Information for this article was contributed by Bela Szandelszky, Mike Eckel, Christopher Torchia, Misha Dzhindzhikhashvili, Matti Friedman, Dmitry Lovetsky, David Nowak, Jim Heintz, Steve Gutterman, Jill Lawless, Maria Danilova, Olga Bondaruk, Paul Ames and Desmond Butler of The Associated Press; and by Michael Schwirtz, Ellen Barry, C. J. Chivers and Andrew E. Kramer of The New York Times.
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