Georgia at mercy of US, Russia, EU geopolitics - SIR 26 June 2007

With the vagaries of Middle Eastern and Russian energy supply, the US is increasingly eyeing Caspian-basin deposits. This is also the case for the EU and many Nato states, which currently rely on Russia’s Gazprom for over 25% of their gas needs. Georgia, which hosts sections of the Baku-Tblisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline (BTC) and Baku-Tblisi-Erzurum gas pipeline (BTE) has therefore assumed considerable strategic importance to US policymakers. They need a strong, stable, and fully unified Georgia in order to ensure uninterrupted energy supply. Russia on the other hand wants to protect Gazprom’s monopoly of European and Georgian gas markets and worries that a stronger Georgia would complicate their handling of the North Caucasian insurgencies. Therefore, it has an interest in keeping the ‘frozen conflicts’ in Abkhazia and South Ossetia alive for as long possible, deterring FDI and making Georgia’s accession to Nato less likely.

Georgia’s pro-Western President Mikhail Saakashvili is in many ways an agent for US/Nato interests, and a strategic asset. For example, his prime minister visited Turkmenistan in March to persuade officials there to transport their oil across the Caspian rather than relying on Russian pipelines. Two weeks earlier, Saakashvili visited Kazakhstan to promote the Kars-Akhalkalaki-Tblisi-Baku railway project (KATB).

His avowed aim in life is to unify Georgia, and he is keen to join Nato as this would "balance Russia". And according to Shalva Pichkhadze, chairman of the Georgia-for-Nato NGO, "Nato membership is one of the most…instrumental options to get these territories back (Abkhazia and South Ossetia)." The US is keen for Georgia to join Nato as soon as possible, whilst other Nato members are still fearful of antagonising Russia. Therefore, the US has stepped in unilaterally to spruce-up the Georgian military through the Train and Equip programme, starting in 2002. Its primary objectives are to strengthen Tblisi’s rule in Georgia’s badlands (eg the Pankisi gorge), pipeline security, and to prevent the smuggling of arms, uranium, and drugs from Russia.

This appeared to pay dividends in early 2004, when Saakashvili reintegrated the semi-separatist Adjaria province and brought the Pankisi Gorge back under Tblisi’s control. However, his military assault on South Ossetia in summer 2004 ended in stalemate and only served to deepen the divisions. Thereafter, the US and EU urged Saakashvili to use less violent tactics in bringing the territories to heel. So, in 2006, Tblisi installed parallel administrations in Georgian-controlled South Ossetia and in the upper Kodori Gorge – the only part of Abkhazia not under Sukumi’s control. These Tblisi-loyal administrations call for a solution that does not compromise Georgia’s territorial integrity, but they lack influence and are regarded by most South Ossetians and Abkhazians as Quislings.

Other non-violent initiatives have been tried, including a massive humanitarian operation in South Ossetia in 2007 and a law passed on 5 April 2007 that defines South Ossetia as a ‘provisional administrative-territorial entity’, with wide-ranging autonomy. However, both measures have been unsuccessful.

Saakashvili has become impatient with this lack of progress and has recently increased the military budget from 0.5% of GDP to 3% and started stockpiling Nato equipment. South Ossetia and Abkhazia have done likewise with Russian assistance, and a militaristic conflict resolution looks increasingly likely.

The head of the US Missile Defence Agency, Lt Gen Henry Obering, recently said that a missile defence station in the Caucasus would be ‘useful’, presumably referring to the threat of Iranian ballistic missiles. However this, along with the installations in Poland and the Czech Republic, would effectively allow the US to control Russia’s airspace, thus eroding Russia’s nuclear deterrent. Georgia, along with Azerbaijan, is the most likely candidate to host the station.

Russia, therefore, has an interest in destabilising Georgia and has done this by keeping the ‘frozen conflicts’ alive. It has installed (or helped to install) Russians in key positions in the South Ossetian and Abkhazian governments including their respective defence ministers – Sultan Sosnaliev and Anatoli Barankevich.

Russia dominates the ‘conflict resolution mechanisms’: Georgians are only a minority in the trilateral Joint Peace Keeping Force (Russia, South Ossetia, Georgia) and quadrilateral Joint Control Commission (Russia, North Ossetia, South Ossetia, Georgia) in South Ossetia, and they do not have any presence in Abkhazia which is monopolised by Russia ‘peacekeepers’. Georgia often complains that these peacekeepers are not at all neutral, pointing to the recent attack on the upper-Kodori gorge on 11 March 2007 and the 1998 Gali clashes when Abkhazian forces were able to drive out 20,000 ethnic Georgians from the Gali region.

Indeed, Putin has declared that Russia would defend the disputed territories if they came under attack by Georgia. Russia has also diminished the role of the OCSE as mediator, and it can now claim that it has a direct stake in the territories thanks to its ‘passportisation’ policy, which means that over 90% of their populations can now be considered Russian citizens. Russia champions the territories on the world stage, making them, along with Transdniestra, key issues on the EU-Russia Agenda and OSCE meetings. It often wheels out the Kosovo precedent: if Kosovo – a nominal province of Serbia – can become independent, then why can’t Abkhazia or South Ossetia?

Russia can also point to itself as South Ossetia’s and Abkhazia’s main economic provider. It has been their main trading partner since 1992, pays their pensions (at the higher Russian rate), creates investment opportunities by subsidising risk premiums, and accepts their imports whilst boycotting goods from the rest of Georgia.

Abkhazia is also likely to benefit from the 2014 Winter Olympics in neighbouring Sochi, as over $12bn has earmarked to build-up the region’s infrastructure. Tblisi can never compete with that kind of money. Such policies have sweetened many South Ossetians and Abkhazians, and a recent referendum held in separatist-held South Ossetia indicates that over 94% never want to integrate with Georgia and over 97% want to become part of the Russian Federation.

Interestingly, the US sometimes acts contrary to Georgia’s interests, and by extension, its own interests in the region. In return for Russian cooperation on North Korea and Iran, the US dropped all objections to Russia joining the WTO and was annoyed with Georgia for not doing likewise.

Similarly, the US supported the pro-Russian UN security resolution of October 2006 which stated that all peacekeepers in Abkhazia should be from the CIS and not elsewhere (ie Europe & America).

Sakaashvili has said he expects the formal invitation to join Nato will come later this year, especially given the unique threat his country faces from Russia. However, there any still many obstacles to Georgia’s Nato accession. These include slow judicial reform, growing authoritarianism, and inconsistencies in defence policy. There are also questions as to whether the Georgian military meets Nato standards.

Negotiations are still only at the ‘intense dialogue’ stage whereas Albania, Croatia, and Macedonia are already working on the Membership Action Plan.

Georgia, according to some, overestimates its own strategic importance, and many Nato members do not think it is worth confronting Russia for the sake of Georgia. Tblisi should also remember that there are over 1 million Georgian expatriates working in Russia and that their remittances shore up the fragile economy. Were Georgia to join Nato, Russia may very well expel all of those expatriates and formally annex/recognise South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

Perhaps the EU will become more of a dominant force in Georgia: like the US and Nato, its main priority is energy security, but it is also keen to shore up a weak state and source of instability that – with the accession of Bulgaria and Romania – is much closer to its borders. Russia may be more receptive to EU peacekeepers than Nato peacekeepers as the EU is generally regarded as an ‘honest broker’ by both sides. However, due to the EU’s ‘Russia First Policy’, it is unclear whether it would ever be able to get tough enough with Russia, if called for.

Therefore SIR predicts that the South Ossetian and Abkhazian conflicts will remain essentially unresolved, and that the US and Nato will turn their attentions to elsewhere in the Caucasus, such as the new golden-boy Azerbaijan. Russia, meanwhile, will increasingly assert itself in Georgia, and punish Tblisi’s indiscretions more harshly.