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On Georgia, As Sarkozy Drafts Sloppily, the World Catches a Cold War

Byline: Matthew Russell Lee of Inner City Press at the UN: News Analysis

UNITED NATIONS, August 19 -- The rift on Georgia at the UN Security Council traces back, as it happens, to French President Nicolas Sarkozy. He traveled to Moscow, as part of France's European Union presidency, and came up with a six point plan agreed to by Russia's Dmitry Medvedev. The sixth point concerned future negotiations of the status and lasting security of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, Georgia's two breakaway regions. Russia, then as now, latched onto the sixth point, as it hearkens to the status talks about Kosovo that resulted in that region's declaration of independence from Serbia.

     After France on Tuesday introduced a draft Security Council resolution which despite Russia's requests did not include Sarkozy's six points, certainly not the sixth, Inner City Press asked France's Deputy Permanent Representative Jean-Pierre Lacroix if his country or president had envisioned the talks on the future of South Ossetia and Abkhazia as including on the table independence, a la Kosovo. We are committed to Georgia's territorial integrity, Ambassador Lacroix answered. One wag at the stakeout snarked, "That's not what Sarkozy said, or got, in Moscow."


Ban Ki-moon and Nicolas Sarkozy - the father of two new countries?

   Afterwards, Inner City Press asked Russian Ambassador Vitaly Churkin if his country interprets Principle Sixth as allowing for the full breakaway of Abkhazia and South Ossetia from Georgia. Yes, he said, and then narrated the history of the clause.  Sarkozy in Moscow agreed with Medvedev to include the word "status" in Principle Six. Then Sarkozy went to Tblisi, where according to Churkin he met with Georgian President Saakashvili and "his American advisors." After that meeting, Sarkozy called Medvedev and asked to "shorten" Principle Six. Churkin said Medvedev agreed, because with the phrasing "lasting security," independence was still on the table in Russia's reading.

  Now, however, France is trying to impose its interpretation on the phrase, as not inconsistent with territorial integrity, ignoring Russia's statement that Sarkozy had agreed to the inclusion of the word "status" in Principle Six.

    Churkin also expressed frustration that Sarkozy had earlier on Tuesday called Medvedev, without mentioning that his mission to the UN would be introducing a draft resolution without the six points in it. Churkin guessed that the mid-day change is attributable "to Brussels," where a meeting of NATO foreign ministers took place.  He also said that prior to Tuesday's meeting requests to participate were submitted by Abkhazia and South Ossetia and reminded that the U.S. had previously problematized visas for Abkhaz representatives to come to New York.

  When we finally do the meeting on the big resolution, Churkin said, if there are problems with the visas, we can move the meeting to a European capital.  See you in Geneva? Or Paris?

Watch this site. And this (on South Ossetia), and this --


   

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These reports are usually also available through Google News and on Lexis-Nexis.

Click here for a Reuters AlertNet piece by this correspondent about Uganda's Lord's Resistance Army. Click here for an earlier Reuters AlertNet piece about the Somali National Reconciliation Congress, and the UN's $200,000 contribution from an undefined trust fund.  Video Analysis here

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