Frozen Conflict Paradigm Persists in the Geneva Process
March 16, 2011
By: Vladimir Socor
In October 2008, two months after Russia’s invasion of
Georgia, a diplomatic process was launched in Geneva to implement the
armistice agreements signed on August 12 and September 8 that year. Two
and a half years later, the fifteenth round of negotiations concluded in
Geneva on March 4, again without results. The participants are Russia,
Georgia, the EU, the US, the United Nations, OSCE, and the
internationally unrecognized Abkhaz and South Ossetian authorities.
Of these participants, the UN and OSCE were summarily
evicted from Abkhazia and South Ossetia in 2008 by Russia; and to
complete the humiliation, Moscow made it appear that the authorities in
Sukhumi and Tskhinvali had evicted these major international
organizations. French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, had brokered the
armistice and the EU took over the responsibility of ensuring its
implementation. The EU, however, lacks the means to do so. The European
Union’s Monitoring Mission (EUMM), (a civilian operation) provides a
temporary, soft-security shield for Georgia, amid the hard-security
deficit that the US and NATO had earlier allowed to develop in the South
Caucasus. Thus, Russia with overwhelming forces in place, and two proxy
votes added to its own, dominates a dysfunctional Geneva process.
Moscow is comfortable with stagnation in the Geneva
process. In a communiqué following the fifteenth round, Russia’s foreign
ministry stated that stability is consolidating along the
Abkhaz-Georgian and South Ossetian-Georgian “borders” [i.e., Russian
deployment lines], civilian incidents are declining in frequency, and
the Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism (IPRM) now regularly
operating helps resolve such situations (Interfax, March 7).
The EU’s chief representative to the Geneva Process,
French diplomat Pierre Morel, seems to share this assessment to a large
extent. Morel is satisfied that the security situation is “relatively
calm” and the latest Geneva round was “very positive.” Paris and,
apparently, Brussels value the Geneva process as the only venue where
the Georgian government and the Abkhaz and South Ossetian authorities
can meet and hold direct talks (Agence France Presse, March 5).
Moscow, Paris, and Brussels can converge on this
lowest-common-denominator. Each of them for its own reasons emphasizes
process in its own right, and stability as the measure of success. Under
this cover, Russia consolidates its strategic gains in the South
Caucasus while the EU avoids dealing with Russia’s breaches of the
armistice in Georgia. Corrective actions even of a piecemeal nature hold
a distant second place in the EU’s order of priorities. Its top
priority is to prevent this situation from affecting EU-Russia
relations.
Washington seeks to balance those same sets of
concerns, albeit with diminishing resources to bring to bear in the
South Caucasus. The US supports Georgia’s goals of demilitarization,
non-use of force, and refugee return in the framework of the Geneva
process. According to Georgian Foreign Minister, Grigol Vashadze,
“Georgia and the US are asking, demanding, insisting” to advance those
goals; but Russia hides behind the Abkhaz and South Ossetian
authorities, claiming that everything depends on them –i.e., on
recognizing them (Radio Free Europe, February 24).
The conflict in its current state reproduces the main
features of the 1992-2008 “frozen conflicts,” with a number of
aggravating differences. Some of these differences are of degree, but
most of them are of substance, with wider implications for the
international order.
First, the pair of conflicts in Abkhazia and in South
Ossetia have fused into one larger conflict, now generally acknowledged
as pitting Russia against Georgia. Despite Moscow’s claims to the
contrary, the 2008 armistice agreements (the basis for this ongoing
Geneva process) show incontrovertibly Russia, not Abkhazia or South
Ossetia, as the party in conflict with Georgia. The West had been in
denial all along about this essential point. Despite this overdue
clarification, Russia’s conduct in this region remains consequence-free
in the West.
Second, Russia has shifted the military demarcation
lines farther south since 2008, fortified those lines, and heavily
militarized the two occupied territories. Moscow’s “suspension” of
implementing the Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe from 2007
onward has facilitated this course of action in Georgia, breaking the
CFE Treaty irreparably at this stage.
Third, Moscow has dropped the pretense of recognizing
Georgia’s territorial integrity, moving instead to recognize Abkhazia
and South Ossetia as “new states.” Russia’s changing recognition
policies made little difference on the ground or internationally,
however. Until 2008, Moscow officially recognized Georgia’s sovereignty
in those two territories, but forcibly prevented Georgia from exercising
that recognized sovereignty. Since 2008, Russian control of the two
territories is growing even tighter, notwithstanding Moscow’s
“recognition” of them as new states.
Fourth, international organizations have been removed
from Abkhazia and South Ossetia (see above) after 16 years of continuous
presence. However ineffective, and subjected to Russia’s veto rights,
the UN and OSCE Missions had provided at least some international
observation of the two Russian-controlled territories. Russia had been
granted a zone of predominance there, but has turned it into a zone of
exclusion.
Fifth, Russia has inspired at the international level
an undeclared arms embargo on Georgia since 2008 and continuing. This
situation would previously have seemed inconceivable for a NATO aspirant
country to experience, or indeed for NATO Allies to accept. Russia
exploits this protracted conflict in attempting to discredit NATO’s
open-door policy.
Sixth, Russia refuses to deal with Georgia’s government
bilaterally (Moscow deals with Tbilisi through the multilateral Geneva
process). Moscow’s policy follows two parallel tracks: explicit
de-recognition of Georgia’s territorial integrity and an implicit
de-recognition of Georgia’s legitimate government. With such policies,
Russia has imposed a deeper “freeze” than at any previous time on a
solution to this protracted conflict.
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