US CONSIDERS PUNISHING RUSSIA FOR GEORGIAN CONFLICT
Argentina Star
Wednesday 13th August, 2008
Argentina
The political players in the recently halted Ossetia war Wednesday have
been scrambling for tactical advantages in ongoing ceasefire talks.
The de facto ceasefire has held, with no violations reported by
either side.
Fighting in the six-day conflict ended shortly after midday Tuesday.
Aside from Georgian reports of a pair of Russian airstrikes after
that time, combat has halted throughout the region.
In Washington, President George Bush’s administration has been
contemplating ways to punish Russia for the military assault on the
pro-Western Georgian government led by President Mikheil Saakashvili,
and is focusing on ways to get humanitarian aid to the Georgian
population.
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has told reporters at the
White House that US retaliation measures against Russia will include
cancellation of a US-Russia joint naval exercise, the Bush’s boycott
of a NATO meeting with Russia and longer-term US diplomacy aimed at
reducing contact between Russia and the G7 nation group.
The Georgian government formally requested NATO assistance shortly
before the ceasefire came into effect, although the Caucasus nation
is not a member of the alliance.
NATO held an emergency meeting Tuesday at its Brussels headquarters,
where Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer said the alliance
will not back off its eventual plans to invite Georgia into the
organization.
The Kremlin strongly opposes membership for Georgia and Ukraine,
another former Soviet republic, and has increasingly expressed dismay
over NATO’s continued eastward expansion.
Some analysts and US politicians allege that Russia launched the
attack to intimidate its neighbours in an attempt to reassert its
sphere of influence.
French President Nicolas Sarkozy, as the EU’s representative the key
mediator between Russia and Georgia in the ceasefire talks, was in
Tbilisi on Wednesday, along with the presidents of Poland, Ukraine,
Lithuania, and Estonia.
Georgian media reported Wednesday that the presence of the foreign
presidents would lead to the eventual installation of an international
peacekeeping force in the Ossetia region – long a political goal of
the Saakashvili administration.
The streets of Tbilisi were practically back to normal Wednesday,
with restaurants open and cafes busy, and a government-organized
pro-Saakashvili demonstration jamming the Georgian capital’s central
Shota Rustaveli Street.
The atmosphere in the city was generally more festive than defiant,
with tens of thousands of Tbilisi residents taking the night air for
the first time since the onset of war Thursday.
In Moscow, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said that Saakashvili
is not a reliable partner for negotiating peace and called on the
US-educated president to resign.
At the same time, Lavrov said that Russia had no intention of ousting
Saakashvili.
Officers at Russia’s 58th Army, the formation responsible for ejecting
Georgia’s military from South Ossetia, likewise said that Moscow had
no long-term plans to occupy the region.
Civilian officials within South Ossetia and particularly its unofficial
capital Tskhinvali were beginning to repair massive damage caused by
intense artillery barrages.
Regional authorities were focusing on identifying and burying corpses,
and supplying civilian survivors food and water, said Anatoliy
Barankevich, South Ossetia’s security council chief, according to an
Interfax report.
A bread factory in the region already was functional and loaf
production had already begun, and martial law was in effect, he said.
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin over the weekend promised close
to a half billion dollars of Kremlin reconstruction money for the
South Ossetia reconstruction effort.
The Russian military said 16 of its soldiers died in the fighting
and 100 others were wounded. Georgia reported 175 dead soldiers and
500 wounded. Russian authorities said they captured an unspecified
number of Georgian troops. Reports of civilian casualties ranged from
200 to 2,000 dead.
The United Nations, European Union and United States were mobilizing to
deliver humanitarian assistance to refugees. About 25,000 people fled
from South Ossetia into Russia, while another 2,000 went to Armenia.
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
