The Georgian Parliament passed a resolution on July 18 instructing the government to launch relevant procedures in order to immediately suspend, as the document reads, “the so-called peacekeeping operations” in breakaway Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

“It is clear that actions undertaken by the Russian Federation’s armed forces in Abkhazia and in former autonomous district of South Ossetia represent one of the major obstacles on the way to solve these conflicts peacefully,” the resolution reads and accuses Russia of “a permanent attempt to annex Georgia’s territory.”

The Parliament also instructed the government to immediately undertake measures necessary “for deployment of the international police forces” in the conflict zones.

But the Parliament’s resolution does not mean that the mandate of peacekeeping troops in Abkhazia and South Ossetia will automatically be ceased. It is now up to the executive authorities to denounce those agreements which make a legal base of current peacekeeping operations in the conflict zones.

President Saakashvili said after voting that the government will take a final decision about peacekeepers after his meeting with Russian President Putin, which is expected to take place on a sideline of CIS summit in Moscow on July 21-20.

The resolution does not set timeframe to the executive authorities for implementing those necessary procedures which should eventually lead to a formal suspending of the current peacekeeping operations.

“Of course setting of deadlines would have been better, but we should understand that we are now in a very serious struggle, which needs time. The most important is that the Georgian government and legislative body are determined to put an end to [current peacekeeping operations],” MP Davit Bakradze, the Chairman of the Parliamentary Committee for European Integration Issues, said at the parliamentary session on July 18.

Parliamentary Chairperson Nino Burjanadze said that Georgia wants international operation, instead of the Russian-led peacekeeping operation in the conflict zones.

She also said that Georgia will sign agreements on non-resumption of hostilities with secessionist authorities of Abkhazia and South Ossetia only under the international aegis. “We want genuinely international guarantees and not those of Russia,” Nino Burjanadze told parliamentarians on July 18. 

Peacekeepers in Abkhazia

About 2 000 Russian peacekeepers are deployed in the Abkhaz conflict zone under the aegis of Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), in accordance to an agreement on Cease-Fire and Separation of Forces signed by the Georgian and Abkhaz sides in Moscow on May 14, 1994.

Russian troops were deployed in Abkhazia on June 21, 1994 under the formal name of Collective Peacekeeping Forces of CIS. The 1994 agreement authorized the peacekeeping forces to maintain the cease-fire and to promote “the safe return of refugees and displaced persons especially to the Gali district.”

Deployment of the peacekeepers was then formally approved with a document adopted by the leaders of the CIS member states on August 22, 1994. The document reads that the peacekeeping troops are deployed upon the request of the Georgian and Abkhaz sides.

The peacekeeping forces were deployed in the conflict zone for six months, but their mandate was prolonged in every half-year. In summer, 2003 by-then Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze said that during the meeting with Russian leader Vladimir Putin, which took place on March 7, 2003 in Sochi, the two Presidents reached an agreement under which Russian peacekeepers can stay in the conflict zone until one of the sides demands their withdrawal.

Peacekeeping Operation in South Ossetia

On February 15, 2006 the Georgian Parliament passed a resolution on peacekeeping operation in South Ossetia, which was flexible and unlike the recent resolution was not instructing the government to immediately launch procedures to cease mandate of the peacekeeping forces.
 
Russian troops are stationed in South Ossetia as part of the Joint Peacekeeping Forces (JPKF), which also involves Georgian and Ossetian servicemen. The JPKF was set up and stationed in the conflict zone based on a June 24, 1992 agreement. Then-Russian President Boris Yeltsin and then-Head of the Georgian State Eduard Shevardnadze signed this agreement in Russia’s resort city of Sochi.

Although the JPKF was set up on the basis of Sochi agreement, a detailed mandate for the joint forces was outlined later in 1992 in agreements signed in frames of the Joint Control Commission (JCC) – a quadripartite negotiating body involving the Georgian, South Ossetian, Russian and Russia’s North Ossetian sides. The JCC was also set up on the basis of the 1992 Sochi agreement.

The 1992 Sochi agreement and following decisions by the JCC mandated that the JPKF provide peace and maintain law and order in the conflict zone. But the JPKF’s mandate was modified in February, 1997 through a decision by the JCC and “maintenance of law and order” was removed from the JPKF’s mandate.

According to the JCC agreement of July 6, 1992, the duration of presence of JPKF is defined by the Heads of States of Russia and Georgia. “The JCC offers its proposals over this issue to the Heads of States,” according to the July 6, 1992 JCC agreement.

Georgia will have to renounce the 1992 Sochi agreement if it wants to cease the JPKF’s activities in the conflict zone. Withdrawal from this agreement will automatically result in ceasing the JCC’s mandate as well.

Opposition’s reaction

Opposition lawmakers, who are boycotting the parliamentary sessions since March 31, 2006, refused to participate in the discussion of the resolution on peacekeepers.

Opposition MPs said that tangible actions from the executive government are needed to put an end to the Russian-led peacekeeping operations, rather than the Georgian Parliament’s resolutions.

“It [adoption of resolutions] is a waste of time. Let the government announce that Georgia quits the CIS and of course this will automatically lead to stopping of the peacekeepers’ mandate in Abkhazia,” MP Levan Berdzenishvili of the opposition Republican Party, said.

Government’s Position
 
Although the Georgia’s top leadership is denouncing the current Russian-led peacekeeping operations in Abkhazia and South Ossetia as ineffective, it is still unclear what will be the executive authorities’ steps following the Parliament’s resolution.

Before the July 18 voting in the Parliament, the Georgian executive authorities were saying that they are waiting for the Parliament’s resolution. After the document was approved President Saakashvili made it clear that he does not hurry to demand peacekeepers withdrawal and said that final decision will be taken after his possible talks with Putin this week.

PM Zurab Nogaideli told reporters on July 17 that neither in South Ossetia, nor in Abkhazia "Russian peacekeepers are fulfilling their mandate and moreover there are no indications that they are going to fulfill it. So we are waiting for the Parliament’s radical decision about these issues.”

“Nothing will hinder to implement the Parliament’s decision,” Defense Minister Irakli Okruashvili said on July 17.

On July 11 President Saakashvili criticized Russian peacekeeping forces and said that “Georgian territory’s intensive annexation is taking place behind these peacekeeping troops.”

The Georgian Parliament has passed a total of six resolutions, including the recent one, about the Russian peacekeeping forces in past nine years. Three out of these six resolutions have been passed in recent nine months (the October 11, 2005 resolution No 1927-II; the February 15, 2006 resolution No 2655-I and the July 18, 2006 resolution). Three previous resolutions are passed by the Parliament during the Eduard Shevardnadze’s presidency in 1997, 2001 and 2002 respectively requesting the executive authorities to pull out peacekeepers from the Abkhaz conflict zone.