Agence France Presse — English
December 10, 2004 Friday 7:15 PM GMT

AFP Interview: Democratic reform in Ukraine will help Russia, says
Georgian FM

MOSCOW

Georgian Foreign Minister Salome Zurabishvili said on Friday that
Russia should realise the benefits for itself of a process of
democratic reform in Ukraine, currently undergoing a period of
political crisis.

Speaking to AFP by phone from the Georgian capital Tbilisi,
Zurabishvili said that in order for the rerun of the second round of
Ukrainian presidential elections to take place peacefully, Russia
must be “warned against the temptation to meddle.”

She said in addition that as many observers as possible should be
deployed in the country for the vote, scheduled to take place on
December 26.

“If Ukraine becomes a democratic country at the frontier of Europe
there can only be winners,” including Russia, she said, adding that
“having borders with stable, democratic countries is something that
could set (Russia) along the same path.”

“Everything must be done to encourage Russia down this path, one
which is difficult to take,” she said.

“What is happening in Russia amounts to an internal decolonisation.
We must encourage them, support them, and help them down this
difficult path, the only one possible if Russia is to evolve in a way
that is sufficiently responsible and safe for both itself and its
neighbours,” she added.

As far as the recent strong criticism levelled by Moscow over the
West’s alleged interference in Ukraine was concerned, and in
particular comments by Russian President Vladimir Putin, Zurabishvili
spoke of a “constant swing between signs that Russia is moving
towards a possible normalisation and and signs that it is slipping
backwards.”

Questioned about the Russian accusations, Zurabishvili said that
there had been no intervention.

“We did not intervene in favour of one candidate of the other. We
intervened in favour of a democratic process,” she said.

“As long as Russia imagines that support for democracy, whether it is
in the Caucasus, Ukraine or elsewhere, is something that is directed
against it, Moscow will fail to understand the way the world is
going.”

The Georgian foreign minister described Moscow’s manifestation of
discontent as “a return to the instincts of the Soviet Union.”

“The big difference is that it does not have any effect any more.
Russian short fuses, which in the past petrified the West, are today
received in a more measured, philosophical way… and do not achieve
the desired effect.”

Zurabishvili also called on Russia to keep out of Georgia’s quarrels
with the separatist republic of Abkhazia, saying that Moscow must
“understand that former Soviet republics had become independent
countries” and that Moscow could not interfere directly in their
affairs.

Abkhazia has de facto independence from Georgia since it defeated
Georgian troops with the help of Russian mercenaries in the early
1990s in the aftermath of the breakup of the Soviet Union.

On the recent decision by Azerbaijan to shut down its cargo rail
traffic to other Caucasus republics because it feared that some of
the goods were being delivered via Georgia to its arch-foe Armenia,
Zurabishvili said Georgia had good relations with both countries.

She said Tbilisi had agreed to prevent transit through its territory
of military goods. But she added: “We refuse to take any economic
sanctions against Armenia.”

She said that if Georgia was anything other than neutral in the
dispute between the two countries, “we would enter into a logic of
escalation which would be not only damaging for us and for our
neighbours, but for the whole region.”