Friends not War – Where a Comma?

Russia and Georgia need to realize that achieving friendly relations should be their number one priority. It is an extremely difficult path to take, but it is the correct one. We need to overcome existing stereotypes, step outside out of these historical and geographical limitations and break down the negative ideologies. The question is: will we be able to do this?

When I was preparing these notes about Russian–Georgian relations and trying to think of a title, I thought to myself: “Where would I put the punctuation mark in this sentence?” We have already seen war, back in the dark days of 2008. And we don’t seem to be able to make friends at all. And then I realized that, unfortunately, the backbone of Moscow’s current policy towards Georgia lies in the one remaining word in the sentence – “not”, meaning “it is impossible” or “you can’t”. You can’t choose an independent course of development. You can’t open a NATO training centre. You can’t lay water or gas pipelines. You can’t do these things, or anything else for that matter, without first asking Moscow what it thinks. But believe me, we’ve done this before, trying to take Moscow’s national interests in the Caucasus into account. We’ve made offers, appealed to the powers to pay attention to the needs of Moscow. And what have we heard in response? In my experience, more often than not, we have heard a resounding “no”, and pretty much nothing else. They would tell us straight to our faces, “You are either with us or against us.” Or they wouldn’t bother to even respond to our requests.

You might ask: “Maybe this is how Georgia sees things?” Unfortunately, however, this has been par for the course since the early 1990s. By the way, I’ve just remembered that when then President of the Russian Federation Boris Yeltsin visited Tbilisi in early 1994, he admitted that Russia had been partially responsible for the Georgian–Abkhaz conflict.

This is precisely the reason why, when Moscow gets nervy about Georgia’s rapprochement with its European and Euro-Atlantic partners, I usually ask my Russian colleagues: “But what are you offering us? Where, and what, is Russia’s policy of being a good neighbour?” Thank you very much, but offers for Georgia to join the Eurasian Economic Union or the Eurasian Customs Union are laughable, as Moscow is well aware.

frontnews.ge
Tedo Japaridze

Moscow symbolically called its actions seven years ago an “enforcement operation”. I fully acknowledge that the Georgian leadership was largely responsible for what happened in August 2008. I shall, however, be so bold as to remind you that there was a period before these events during which yours truly, as Minister of Foreign Affairs of Georgia tried to explain that we were ready to start with a clean slate. There was a time before the Revolution of Roses when there was still hope that a breakthrough might occur in our relations with Russia. It was during the time that Nino Burjanadze, in her role as Acting President of Georgia following the ousting of Eduard Shevardnadze, held talks with Vladimir Putin in Moscow. Mikheil Saakashvili’s first official visit after being sworn in as President of Georgia was to the Russian capital. After meeting with Putin, Saakashvili said that he could see light at the end of the tunnel for Russian–Georgian relations. And how can we not call that period now a period of missed opportunities, missed opportunities that proved disastrous for political relations and diplomacy?

The 12th Munich Conference, in which I took part, once again brought us into a vicious circle. This time it is Ukraine. Together, could we have prevented the catastrophe that is taking place today if we had learned the lessons of 2008 properly? There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that we could have.

Just look at what the Prime Minister of Georgia Irakli Garibashvili has been saying at the conference in Munich. It is the quintessence of Georgian policy towards Russia, and the essence of Georgia’s disappointment with Russian policy towards Georgia. “The Georgian leadership is open to talks with Russia,” the head of our cabinet proclaims from his podium. “The meeting has to be well thought out and aimed towards achieving results.”

However, 20% of Georgian territory is occupied, namely Abkhazia and South Ossetia – both historically Georgian provinces. And we have seen absolutely no progress whatsoever, despite the obvious change in Georgian policy following the most recent change of government. “We have made attempts to normalize relations with Russia,” Garibashvili continued. “And we have changed our attitude towards the country. But our efforts have not been met in kind. On the contrary, Russia’s position has become even tougher.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin once said that ex-President of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili is not the kind of man that one can negotiate with. The people of Georgia remember this very well. A new government came to power and former Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili immediately set about appointing a special representative to Russia. Negotiations were initiated. Georgia demonstrated to Russia and the whole world that it was constructive in its approach, and ready for peace and for the restoration of trust between the two countries. We separated politics from economics. Trade and economic relations were resumed. Still, no progress was made whatsoever in the political sphere! Quite the opposite: Russia signed a “friendly” agreement with Abkhazia and is preparing a similar document to be signed with South Ossetia, causing extreme scepticism not only among the political establishment, but also among the general Georgian population. Is that a reasonable response to our efforts towards rapprochement? Is it reasonable to separate Georgia from Ossetia by a new 60-kilometre barbed-wire “Berlin Wall”? Wire that cuts and chokes familial ties and closes off access to holy sites such as churches and cemeteries?

RIAC, ICCN:
Россия — Грузия: ключевые направления
взаимоотношений

Of course it isn’t. That’s why it is difficult for us to predict what Russia will do next; that’s why our movement towards the West is a path towards a “security umbrella”. There are simply no other alternatives for ensuring our own safety. And the example of Georgia goes to show that before Ukraine there was Georgia, and if the international community had paid more attention to the 2008 conflict and helped out more, then the Ukrainian crisis would not have happened. It’s a depressing thought, but perhaps sanctions should have been levied seven years ago, rather than now.

Let us go back even further, to early 2004. I have no doubt that this will help us better understand the opportunities that were missed, what we overlooked and underestimated. It may also help to draw some conclusions for the future.

This is what I wrote to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Moscow then: “I have high hopes for 2004, which promises to be a turning point in terms of strengthening mutual understanding between our countries and raising bilateral relations to a qualitatively new level. At the same time, we all understand that we have much work to do to ensure a speedy resolution to the backlog of problems that has built up over the past few years.” The main message was the following: “Of course, it is in Georgia’s interests to have close and neighbourly relations with Russia. Likewise, it is in Russia’s interests to have a reliable, stable, predictable and agreeable neighbour. It would seem that our interests are aligned. So what is stopping us? As is often the case in our politics, feelings have prevailed over reason. Emotions have prevented us from rationally assessing the situation and choosing the correct course of action. For a long time, we have been unable to understand that the other side has the right to see reality in a different way. Our mutual recognition of this right will enable us to steer the dialogue in a constructive direction, understand each other’s interests and build a policy based on this.”

Tell me, is this not true today as well, eleven years later?

“Nothing good for either country can come of a policy of errors and mistakes,” I continued, “We have to correct the mistakes that we have made. You will probably agree that Russia too has failed to become a true partner of Georgia. The problem is that state interests at the level of Russia’s political elite, that is, at the level of those who make the decisions, are not always aligned with their interagency, intradepartmental or, dare I say it, personal interests. What we get is a disparity between the interests of the state and the interests of certain political elites.”

I think we ought to pay special attention to these last few sentences. As it turns out, my written appeal never even made it to the addressee. And that is lamentable, because it reflected my fear of this “disparity”, a disparity that grew from the dangerous calm and quagmire of bureaucracy into the clatter of tanks.

In that very same 2004, there was a widespread belief in Tbilisi that work on the Draft Treaty on the Foundations of Friendly Relations between Georgia and the Russian Federation would be completed and subsequently signed. Work on the draft treaty started way back in the early 1990s when Boris Yeltsin was president of Russia.

However, not only was that agreement, which could have become a solid foundation for bilateral relations between Russia and Georgia, not signed, today the two countries do not have any kind of diplomatic relations whatsoever.

RIAC, ICCN:
Russia-Georgia: Challenges and Perspectives
in Economic Sector

Even back then we were telling our Russian colleagues that the settlement of the conflicts in Abkhazia and South Ossetia would significantly increase stability and security in the Caucasus region as a whole, which is in the interests if the Russian Federation. Believe me when I tell you that the Prime Minister of Georgia’s appeals to the people of Abkhazia and Ossetia as “brothers” were honest and sincere. I am sure that in the current geopolitical reality, this would work to Russia’s favour. And see if you don’t agree with how it resonates with something I read recently in your publication: “In the past, unrecognized states and ‘frozen’ conflicts in the post-Soviet space often became sources of diverse political and economic problems for Russia. Right now, the possibility of reaching compromise is close to zero. What’s more, the Lugansk and Donetsk people’s republics, whose territory and population are larger than all the existing state anomalies put together, are about to be added to the list of various unrecognized entities. What will this mean for Russia politically and economically over the next ten years? And what should Russia’s strategy be?”

There are more questions than there are answers. And the animosity between Russia and Georgia only aggravate the situation, when it would seem that we could work together to find a way out of the current impasse. For this to happen, Russia and Georgia need to realize that achieving friendly relations should be their number one priority. It is an extremely difficult path to take, but it is the correct one. We need to overcome existing stereotypes, step outside out of these historical and geographical limitations and break down the negative ideologies. The question is: will we be able to do this?

The punctuation mark in the conditional title of our bilateral relations depends on the answer to this question.

Make friends, not war.