Back Entrance

The inhabitants of Didi (Big) and Patara (Little) Liakhvi do not opportunity to move freely in their own country.

Tskhinvali is surrounded with the villages controlled by the Georgian side. Blocked roads near Ergneti and Tamarasheni (villages) make movement problems for the inhabitants. Te road which leads to the Liakhvi gorge crosses the forest.

One part of the road is controlled by Georgians  and another by Ossetians. The transport on the road is not safe and the passengers fear that they might be shot.

The representatives of the „Human Rights Centre“ arrived in the village Kurta though this road. People from the gorge are served with the bus granted by the Meyer of Tbilisi Giorgi Ugulava free of charge. The road from Eredvi to Kurta is quite long, though nobody speaks about the length of the road. Passengers almost do not speak and are looking to the windows with fear. 

Sister of Alan Koteev, the inhabitant of Kurta village is living in Tskhinvali. The Ossetian man who was born in Kurta tell us that he has never experienced pressure from Georgian people. Although he is worrying about the blocked roads. “When the roads are blocked, we are not able to visit our relative. In such case we do not have any contacts with them. When the roads are open, we go to Ergneti through back entrance and then manage to move to Tskhinvali; it’s even harder to go there through Tamarasheni”- says Alan Koteev.

Korneli Kakhniashvili had been training sportsmen in Tskhinvali for several years. He had to leave Tskhinvali because of the tensed situation. He remembers the people he had to leave in Tskhinvali with warmth and love. “Almost every sportsman is brought up by me in Tskhinvali. I have good relation with them until now, but when the conflict situation is tensed I am not able to meet them. I know many Ossetians in Tskhinvali who spreak to each other in Georgian. General people are not against us, they even want it. But police control them and they have to please their government”- Korneli Kakhniashvili says.

The road connecting two gorged is still under construction. One million and three hundred thousand GEL has been spent on the reconstruction of this road, it is not still safe. There still danger that during rainy days the transport may fall somewhere. Local governments of Kurta and Eredvi got interested in the finances allocated for the reconstruction of the back road. The local government of the Liakhvi gorge doubt that money was spent not adequately and because of that, the road was not reconstructed well.

Badri Basiashvili, the head of Kurta local government mentions that one million no==more GEL has been allocated for the reconstruction of the road. “It’s pity that it is not yet estimated if the work done is adequate to the spent money allocated by the European Commission. At the same time the government allocated one more million laris to the same people”- Basiashvili says.

It’s obvious that governmental high officials are using the situation in Kurta. Conflict zone is the best way for money laundering. About a year ago, journalist Nino Dalakishvili wrote an article in the newspaper Rezonansi. The article read how MIkheil Kareli, the presidential representative in Shida Kartli was asking the prime minister to allocate money for the same work that was financed by the European Commission in conflict zone. That time, the journalist applied to Gori Prosecution office, but the appeal was not followed by any reaction yet. 

There must be a project of the rehabilitation of the road. The project had detailed budget for the reconstruction works. But today the rehabilitation works of the back road need one more million GEL without existing any project on it. It’s noteworthy that it happened after the president of Georgia went to Liakhvi gorge though back entrance and was not satisfied with the roads.

Thea Tedliashvili