STATE DEPARTMENT FOREIGN PRESS CENTER BRIEFING

Federal News Service
August 19, 2008 Tuesday

SUBJECT: THE SITUATION IN THE REPUBLIC OF GEORGIA AND ITS IMPLICATIONS FOR THE CAUCASUS;

BRIEFER: MATTHEW BRYZA, DEPUTY ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF STATE FOR EUROPEAN AND EURASIAN AFFAIRS;

LOCATION: THE FOREIGN PRESS CENTER, WASHINGTON, D.C.

Q (Inaudible) — News Service, Voice of America. Do you think Kosovo’s
independence could be a precedent for all this turmoil? Also, what
do you think, can Armenia — neighboring countries play any positive
role in easing the situation?

Thanks.

MR. BRYZA: Certainly we know that there are those in the Russian
government who had wanted this — Kosovo to be a precedent for what
just happened in Abkhazia and in South Ossetia. Legally, there’s no
foundation for that at all. In international law, the principle of
territorial integrity — and I say this to an Armenian friend carefully
— the principle of territorial integrity occupies the highest
priority when we begin the process of conflict resolution — separatist
conflict resolution. It simply is a fact of international law. It is —
territorial integrity is an international legal principle.

In other conflicts, we say if the two sides decide that they can
reach a compromise that incorporates other elements of international
diplomatic practice or international law, like self-determination of
peoples, terrific. That’s what we want to do in the case of Karabakh,
have a negotiated political compromise that takes into account both
of these principles.

In the case of Kosovo, there’s another principle of international
law or international legal practice that came into play, which is
that if there is a severe humanitarian crisis, then this supremacy of
territorial integrity is suspended, and the international community
has the right to come up with or search for mechanisms to resolve
that conflict, again, in the name of a humanitarian venture. That
is what happened in Kosovo, and that is what led us to the Security
Council Resolution 1244 that allowed for the international community
to work together with former President Ahtisaari on his plan.

So these are fundamentally different situations based on international
legal practice. And I — we don’t believe there’s any precedential
nature of Kosovo for anything else. It’s unique.