RUSSIA SEES EXCLUSION FROM PIPELINE EXERCISES IN GEORGIA AS SNUB – PAPER
Nezavisimaya Gazeta, Moscow
23 Aug 05
Moscow views its exclusion from military exercises in Georgia as an
unfriendly move by Tbilisi, the Russian newspaper Nezavisimaya Gazeta
has said. The paper also noted that the exercises, held to improve
measures to protect the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan Pipeline, were attended
by forces from Georgia, Turkey and Azerbaijan, but not Armenia. The
following is an excerpt from a report published by Nezavisimaya Gazeta
on 23 August:
The Georgian leadership has demonstrated yet again and in a very
forthright way that it is not much bothered about the interests of its
neighbours in the South Caucasus. This was made obvious for Russia and
its only military ally in this region, Armenia, by the Eternity-2005
staff-command exercises to protect the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan Pipeline
[BTC] that are taking place this week at the Georgian Ministry of
Defence’s national Military Base in Tbilisi. It is worth noting
that this demarche took place immediately after the two-day meeting
between presidents Mikheil Saakashvili and Robert Kocharyan at Sevan,
which analysts regarded primarily as a demonstration of a clear
rapprochement between Yerevan and Tbilisi. However, all things
considered, in reality it was somewhat different. Account is being
taken in Georgia of Kocharyan, but only within definite limits.
As far as concerns the Tbilisi exercises, which are to last until
the end of the week, 52 officers from the armed forces of Georgia,
Azerbaijan and Turkey have been invited to attend. Turkey is financing
the exercises. [Passage omitted[
Taking everything into consideration, nobody in Tbilisi sees any
special problem in the fact that there are no Russian or Armenian
representatives among those invited. Let us say that the Georgian
Defence Ministry is stressing how these exercises are basically
“theoretical”. “Officers from the three countries are attending a
special course of lectures and working out their actions via computer
programmes, nothing more,” the head of the Press and Public Relations
Department of the Georgian Defence Ministry, Nana Intskirveli, told
Nezavisimaya Gazeta.
However, in Moscow the very fact that these exercises were not open
to Russian representatives is being viewed as yet another unfriendly
move by the Georgian leadership. As we were told by the deputy
director of the Russian Academy of Sciences’ International Security
Problems Institute, Aleksey Bogaturov, “everything is logical here”.
“Generally speaking, I do not know a single expert or analyst,
who would have hopes that the Georgian leadership would invite the
Russian side to an event of this kind. Tbilisi’s actions are completely
in line with the stance taken by President Mikheil Saakashvili. If
the Georgian side is following a curtailment of military relations
with Russia, and has forced the removal of Russian bases from its
territory, then there is no sense for Saakashvili to invite Russia
to any joint actions and even let Moscow know about its plans. The
Georgian president’s logic is completely different: namely he wishes
to show that the political activity by Georgia as well as all the
Caucasian states is completely possible and viable (in both political
and purely military relations) without Russia’s participation. Time
and again Saakashvili is attempting to form some illusory anti-Russian
‘opposition front’. In this case he does not fully understand whom he
should oppose and what the prospects for such a front are. He simply
has a great wish to be a member of something, and even something more,
namely to be the initiator of a new coalition”, Aleksey Bogaturov
told us.
In Azerbaijan the authorities have preferred not to take any notice
of the Georgian demarche; after all the problem of the security of
the BTC pipeline is somewhat more important. As far as possible
threats to the 3bn-dollar project are concerned, Azerbaijan sees
two of them at least. Firstly there is the problem of potential
sabotage along the course of the pipeline from various terrorist
organizations. Secondly relations between Azerbaijan and Armenia have
not been regularized. [Passage omitted]
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress