open Democracy News Analysis - caucasus: regional fractures - Comments

Manfred Ostrowski on "Georgia's pluralistic feudalism: a frontline report"

Manfred Ostrowski — Sat, 04 Jul 2009 17:25:21 +0100

Manfred Ostrowski

The article does not address the main reason for Georgia's

crisis: A highly hostile Russia which took control over two

parts of Georgia, Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The conflict

between Russia and Georgia is centered around the Russian

claim to support "independence" for Abkhazia and South

Ossetia for ethnic reasons. I have studied Caucasian languages for many years and would like to mention

some crucial facts regarding this conflict:

There are only around 97 000 Abkhaz in what is now Abkhazia, less than 20% of the pre-war population

of this territory; the remaining inhabitants were Georgians,

the Mingrelians (near relatives of the Georgians), and

people of Russian descent. Only a minority of these

roughly 97 000 ethnic Abkhaz still speaks their native

language, and since the Abkhaz remain a minority in the territory of (now Russian-controlled) Abkhazia, the ethnic argument for an independent Abkhazia which neglects rights to the Georgian and Mingrelian part of the population is completely flawed.

According to official data, there were around 180 000

ethnic South Ossetin in pre-war Georgia, the majority

in South Ossetia, but others living in ethnic "pockets"

elswhere in Georgia. Many Georgians lived in South

Ossetia, and a lot of Georgian place names testify that

Georgians were the native and autochthonous inhabitants

in the main part of what is now South Ossetia. So it is

highly problematic to divide politically along Ossetin:
Georgian lines to construct borders, since this ultimately

means the resettlement of large numbers of ethnic Georgians

and ethnic Ossetin. Georgia surely has not yet recovered

from the war last year, but the factual weakness of Russia's

political justification for dismantling Georgia should not go unnoticed, and if one speaks about democracy in Georgia,

one should also take a look at Abkhazia and South Ossetia

where current lack of political freedom is obvious.

jelger72 on "A Georgian appeal: open letter to the west "

jelger72 — Wed, 24 Jun 2009 09:17:35 +0100

Georgia needs to unite and not split itself by people who choose themselves to be a
maverick, and promising "real democracy" without really indicating specifically what that
means.

Burjanadze, and many others do not seem to realize that their current behavior adds to
the Russian abuse of Georgian territories. They blame Saakashvili for the August war, but
fail to recognize the well documented processes and events in the months before the war,
which clearly indicate a Russian hand, means and prupose in provoking the war in such a
way that any country who respects itself cannot just sit by and laugh it off. The
opposition is least to say very naive about the prelude of the war, and where to put the
final blame of the occurence of the war.

"or support a decisive campaign for freedom and real democracy in Georgia. "

I have learned to be very sceptical about such expressions. "real democracy". The
democracy of Burjanadze is the one where the voter votes, and the extra-parliamentary
opposition decides that the vote of the people should be neglected. That is what i see.
Despite irregularities reported in presidential elections both in campaign and in voting,
they were not that big that the election result would have been different in "perfect 10"
conditions. Obviously the task should be to correct authorities on the democratic level.
That does not necessarily means to ask for regime change.

abuelita42pj on "Five years to the day: violence in Ingushetia"

abuelita42pj — Tue, 23 Jun 2009 21:06:20 +0100

You are right with your analogy of the Spartans. The one that came to my mind as I read your article was more Russian in origin--Ivan the Terrible and his means of destroying his own sons if they thought anything different than he did. But then guns are faster and leave fewer signs than crucifixion.

ch1 on "Unlocking the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict "

ch1 — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 21:52:30 +0100

This text is extremely biased. 94% of Nagorno-Karabakh were Armenians, and the lands were given to the Azeris by Russia to soften their relationships with the Turks. The same thing happened in Nakhitchevan, where Azeris deliberately massacred Armenians there, destroyed all/most historical monuments to erase traqces of Armenians who lived there since before Jesus Christ. Karabakh was Artsakh -- an Armenian province. The Azeris tried to Azerify Karabakh by banning Armenian books, TV programs, school, encourageing settlement of muslims there, turning historical Armenian churches to mosques. Where is the democracy in this? Armenians stood up and fought against Azrbaijan, and although extremely outnumbered, they won the war. It was a fight for freedom, not because some Armenians newspaper spread hate for Turks. If Armenians hate Turks, it is not because Armenians are barbaric ignorant fools, it's because they have a reason.

The person who wrote this is either ignorant of Armenian-Turk relationships, or extremely biased towards Turks.

08001 on "A Georgian appeal: open letter to the west "

08001 — Wed, 17 Jun 2009 01:20:44 +0100

Mrs Burjanadze - As someone who formerly respected you as a political figure your conduct throughout the recent protests has been an utter disgrace. You seem intent on preventing any kind of dialogue, have insisted on using inflammatory language and seem to be recklessly destabilising Georgia to prove to everyone your own newly found zeal for opposition.

While I understand that the removal of Saakashvili was the only thing the disparate opposition groups could agree on, it was obvious to the vast majority of observers that this simplistic demand for his resignation was going to be completely unconstructive and end up destabilising Georgia at a crucial time.

Saakashvili is only in his second term and has a mandate to rule until 2013. Nothing in your letter suggests that you are concerned he will seek a third term. If he was to do so then your claim to be protecting Georgia's democracy would be obvious and you would certainly have my whole-hearted support. Instead you seem to be currently undermining the future of Georgian democracy.

As a leader of the opposition you have a duty to steer the popular support your movement has along with the widespread dissatisfaction with the government towards constructive criticism and practical demands without preconditions in order to end the deadlock. This would ultimately galvanise rather than undermine the opposition. You should be more worried about holding the government accountable which I think you did very effectively with your '43 questions' as an example, rather than seeking to replace one Misha with fourteen or fifteen.

K Demetrious on "A Georgian appeal: open letter to the west "

K Demetrious — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 11:09:37 +0100

Thank you Mrs Burjanadze for your story but how can we believe you when i remember attending your meeting with LSE students in London Last year and you talked about how much Georgia achieved in last 4 years since MR Saakashivili came to power, you talked about Failed state Georgia once was, and changes that you and Saakashvili achieved, i think it is remarkable that Country changes radically and Saakashvili is the reason for good changes, he made powerful stance against corruption and i think whole world knows that now, and now we hear that you were dismissed because your husband was involved in some kind of border control corruption and now that you both are sucked from your work you are destroying everything you and others were building for years, so why should we believe you now??? and what other changes you may bring when we see that all opposition politicians in the country are more violent and aggressive then current government, also we very well know that current government has employed Georgian young professionals to deal with Economy and future reforms and oppositions only has young activist with no strong educational background and they are involved in violent and illegal actions in Tbilisi everyday.!

Inge on "A Georgian appeal: open letter to the west "

Inge — Fri, 12 Jun 2009 21:50:07 +0100

I wonder if Burjanadze desires change only for her own benefit. Thought she did rather well in november 2007, but a change like this, and looking at her family and history, only constitutes the fear she might loose her elite powers.
PS not saying I like Saakashvili myself, but the opposition isn't any better either. it's a shame (both ways)

Matin Khalilli on "Unlocking the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict "

Matin Khalilli — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 05:17:07 +0100

Justice is flourishing at long last!

elnur on "Unlocking the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict "

elnur — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 07:27:11 +0100

It is encouraging to see articles written by clever people of honor. I think fair coverage by internaitonal media will be a very important part of the solution. A good start. Alexander Goryanin, thank you.

Vanes on "Russia/Georgia: War of the Web"

Vanes — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 01:49:16 +0100

Well, one may disagree with the author at some points, but one thing remains clear: the forum audience here is (almost?) exclusvely russian, because it has been translated to inoSMI. Coincidence? I'm not accusing anybody of anything, but didn't happen exactly what he has written? The article does not have to be heinous or biased - just bitter and critical - and there will always be many people zeaously defending themselves as not being manipulated, because ... well this is just how people work. Nobody thinks he's being manipulated. Let's just ask: anybody would consider russians to be neutral and unbiased about their own criticism? Hell no. The important message is this: if you can select the audience, you can effectively manipulate the reaction without directly manipulating anyone. Translating and linking an article is not good nor bad - but surely it is a form of selecting the audience.

gocha G. on "Georgia on the brink - again"

gocha G. — Tue, 02 Jun 2009 12:42:47 +0100

Totally dimented review of the events!!!!! And the foreign businessman only cares about his money, not Georgia. Why does not he names himself? He supports Saakashvili, the key beater and opressor, so why fearing? But I can fear for myself in this country totally scr...ed up by the west and satanic russia...
...People went to police because the three detained men were brutally tortured, not because they just wanted to free them. The police used special plastic bullets directly pinpointing the opposition leaders - shooting them in the heads. There was blood everywhere -could not Parsons check youtube at least????? Regarding the fact that there was no police around the demonstration area all the time from 9 April - actually more than 100 people were beaten during the period in the night time. They were beaten by police in civilian dressing and masks (or else why not a single case was investigated?). The same civilian dressed police rascals in recent days have attacked again the people at the Rustaveli avenue in the night. And started beating. Eveything was shown on the TV (Parsons, check at least youtube, you are the lier willingly or unwillingly! Then other people came to support the demonstrators). Dozens of demonstrators and several of those rascals were badly injured and police immediately announced that demonstrators attacked their peaceful police officers and only police suffered...and so on and so on. I would not continue or else it will take hundreds of lines to comment on every lie or misleading info that this story provides....You western quasi-journalists just don't really care what would you write about other - "second rate" - countries...

MercifulBoss on " Russia vs Georgia: a war of perceptions"

MercifulBoss — Mon, 25 May 2009 03:30:06 +0100

Most people here are fools and highly mistaken. Let me address the main issue first.

This article is highly biased, it portrays Russia as an evil empire since the dawn of time. Consider this, has America not committed Genocides and crimes in it's 200 year history. Russia and every other country has in the course of it's 2000 year history. Therefore, any points from history are irrelavent to the current situation for they apply to all nations.

Why wasn't the recent conflict in Kosovo observed and "analyzed", where the Americans did the same thing. Oh, it's America, its allowed to Im sorry. Also, Russia is perhaps less prejudice or racist, or "xenophobic" then America. Wasn't America the nation that had a prospering slave trade in the South, and would have retained it if not for the Revolution? Indeed it was. How about the South Ossetian - Georgian war in 1992, the one that was won by South Ossetia, as Russia was simply unable to help. Georgia was bitter over it's defeat, and wished to return its land? Once again the point in the article falls.

And to the fool above me. Lithuania was not occupied, never by the Soviets. It was occupied by the Germans who killed huge amounts of the population, which the Soviets then freed. Based upon this one article, and many others I have read, it seems that Russian media is not everywhere, but rather American media, and the media of the West.

And to the writer of this article. You are a fool, that is ignorant of the fundamentals of history, and lack logic. If you delete my post, it simply proves the fact that this Blog is certainly not democratic, as here it is portrayed.

alikos on "Russia/Georgia: War of the Web"

alikos — Sun, 24 May 2009 02:02:39 +0100

Где-то я уже похожее читал, причём буквально один в один... :)

Stephan A. Fitch on "Georgia on the brink - again"

Stephan A. Fitch — Thu, 21 May 2009 13:45:40 +0100

This could not have summed up the situation any better. It is a excelent piece with sharp observation & analysis of how things sit & where it all may lead the country to. I think this article should be distributed to all the political leaders in Georgia to give them some badly needed context that is undoubtedly missing, judging from their actions. (I am a business man with extensive operations in Georgia.)

Not logged in on "Georgia’s search for itself"

Not logged in — Tue, 19 May 2009 12:44:25 +0100

President Lincoln -- : "I do the very best I know how the very best I can and I mean to keep doing so until the end. If the end brings me out all right which is said against me won't amount to anything .If the end brings me out wrong ten angels swearing I was right would make no difference"