GEORGIA ACCUSES RUSSIA OVER FOILED REBELLION
Globe and Mail
May 5 2009
Canada
MUKHROVANI — Georgia said it put down a mutiny at a military base
on Tuesday and accused Moscow of trying to foment a wider rebellion
on the eve of NATO war games in the former Soviet republic.
Russia, which fought a war with neighbouring Georgia last year, denied
involvement and said President Mikheil Saakashvili was trying to
shift the blame for weeks of opposition protests demanding he resign.
Around 30 tanks and armoured personnel carriers entered the Mukhrovani
tank base 19 kilometres from Tbilisi about three hours after news
broke of a military uprising. Mr. Saakashvili later followed them,
and authorities said the rebellion was over.
It was not clear how many of the 500 soldiers at the base were
involved, but their commander was arrested along with seven other
military police officers. Three others were on the run, said police,
who also detained 13 civilians.
Georgian Defence Minister David Sikharulidze said the rebellion was
aimed at disrupting month-long NATO exercises beginning on Wednesday
at a former Russian air force base several kilometres from Mukhrovani.
Russia has condemned the planned exercises as an attempt at
"muscle-flexing".
"What happened today is the end of that dark era when certain forces
try to undermine Georgian statehood," Mr. Sikharulidze said.
Earlier, Russia’s Interfax news agency said Mukhrovani base commander
Mamuka Gorgishvili had made a statement criticizing the government
but pledging not to use force in the stand-off on the streets between
opposition supporters and the authorities.
"One cannot look calmly at the process of the country falling apart,
at the ongoing confrontation. But our tank unit will not resort to
any aggressive actions," the agency quoted Mr. Gorgishvili as saying.
After his arrest, police released a video of Mr. Gorgishvili telling
police another officer had offered him money to send tanks to Tbilisi,
saying "the opposition is waiting."
A spokesman for the U.S. Pentagon said the mutiny appeared to be
"a fairly isolated incident at this point."
Mr. Saakashvili accused the plotters of links to Moscow and demanded
Russia "refrain from provocations".
Georgia’s opposition accused the government of staging "a show" to
deflect attention from their protests over his record on democracy
and last year’s war.
Russia said Mr. Saakashvili’s accusations were insane.
"Today what is happening is what we have always feared – the Georgian
leadership are trying to shift their domestic problems on to Russia,"
Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin told reporters.
"Instead of dialogue inside the country, the Georgian leadership is
trying to accuse Russia of totally insane things."
Military experts in Tbilisi suggested the rebellion could be linked
with plans to use troops to end opposition road blocks paralyzing
Tbilisi, with some officers refusing to participate.
"This chimes with what we are hearing from military sources," a senior
Western diplomat said.
Georgia lost a brief war against neighbouring Russia last August when
Russia crushed in days a Georgian assault on the rebel pro-Moscow
region of South Ossetia. Conflict over South Ossetia and another
breakaway region, Abkhazia, destabilized Georgia in the early 1990s.
The August war slammed the brakes on Georgia’s bid for membership of
NATO, which the Kremlin fiercely opposes as an encroachment on its
traditional sphere of influence. It has also increased pressure on
Mr. Saakashvili.
Ties between Russia and NATO have come under new strain over the
exercises and the expulsion last week of two Russian diplomats
accredited at Moscow’s mission to NATO in Belgium.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov dropped plans to attend a
meeting of the NATO-Russia Council this month in protest at the
expulsion. NATO said it regretted Moscow’s decision and hoped a new
date would be agreed for the talks.
Fitch ratings agency said it would likely cut Georgia’s B+ debt rating
if political instability continued.
Russia’s NATO envoy Dmitry Rogozin said NATO would be better off
holding its exercises in a "madhouse", since "Georgia’s military
cannot properly receive their colleagues because they are rioting
against their own president".
The NATO exercises involving some 1,000 soldiers from member states and
partner nations are intended as a gesture of solidarity for Georgia,
which sits at the heart of a region crucial for energy transit from
the Caspian Sea to Europe.
They are due to take place around 70 km from the nearest Russian
troop positions in breakaway South Ossetia.
Russian ally Armenia said on Tuesday it had decided against
participating, citing "the current situation." Kazakhstan and Serbia
have also pulled out.