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Recognition a Lonely Exercise for Moscow 05 September 2008 By Nabi Abdullaev / Staff Writer Ten days after Russia recognized South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent states, the only other country to have followed suit as of Thursday was that Cold War battlefield of the 1980s: Nicaragua. Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega's announcement this week of his Central American nation's recognition of the breakaway Georgian regions was a "pleasant surprise," a Foreign Ministry spokesman said Thursday. Closer to home, however, Russia's allies among former Soviet republics have remained reticent on the issue. The Collective Security Treaty Organization, a Russia-led alliance of...

The President of Venezuela Hugo Chavez, officially declared Saturday his country's support of Russia and of their decision to recognize South Ossetia's and Abkhazia's independence. With their President's declaration Venezuela became the second country to officially recognize South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Belarus is the other one - they declared earlier their support of the decision of the Russian government. "We support Russia. Russia has all the right to defend their own interest," Chavez said in a televised statement.

Chairman of the Central Muslim Board of Russia, Supreme Mufti, Sheikh ul-Islam Talgat Tajuddin addressed regional Muslim boards and believers appealing for them to render necessary help and support to the people of South Ossetia and all those who suffered from the humanitarian catastrophe in the territory of this republic. REGNUM correspondent reports referring to the Central Muslim Board's press office. The Supreme Mufti of Russia has also called on the whole Muslim world to recognize independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. ''Russian Muslims, like all our compatriots, support decision of the Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on recognition of independence...

AUGUST 29, 2008 Ethnic cleansing of Georgians in the now seperated Provinces of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, which Russia has officially recognized as indepenednet, is now proceedingat a rapid pace. Georgian homes and villages are being burned and raised and Georgian civilians are being forced to leave...many with nothing but what they can wear and carry, if that. Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili announced that Georgia was officially breaking diplomatic ties with Russia, ordering its diplomats and staff to leave Moscow and return to Georgia. The action comes as a direct Georgian response to Moscows recognition of its two Provinces...

AFTER barely 100 days in office, the soft-spoken Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s president, has been cast in the unlikely role of war leader. His initial job appeared to be as Vladimir Putin’s spokesman. But he quickly got a taste for war. On Tuesday August 26th he stood beneath the two-headed Russian eagle and solemnly announced the Kremlin’s decision to recognise the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The decision, Mr Medvedev argued, was forced on him by Georgia’s “genocide” against South Ossetia. But the argument is spurious. It is true that, in the early 1990s, when Georgia was barely a state,...

Military help for Georgia is a 'declaration of war', says Moscow in extraordinary warning to the West Last updated at 16:47pm on 27.08.08 Moscow has issued an extraordinary warning to the West that military assistance to Georgia for use against South Ossetia or Abkhazia would be viewed as a "declaration of war" by Russia. The extreme rhetoric from the Kremlin's envoy to NATO came as President Dmitry Medvedev stressed he will make a military response to US missile defence installations in eastern Europe, sending new shudders across countries whose people were once blighted by the Iron Curtain. And Moscow also...

PRESIDENT Dmitry Medvedev's surprise decision to recognise Abkhazia and South Ossetia was met with cries of joy in the breakaway territories, dismay in Tbilisi and deep unease among Russia's neighbours in eastern Europe. In Sukhumi, Abkhazia's seaside capital, Maxim Gunjia, the deputy foreign minister, said that the "people were celebrating in the streets". In Tskhinvali, South Ossetia's war-torn centre, reporters said the air was filled with the demonstrators marking independence by firing Kalashnikovs and hunting guns. However, in Tbilisi, the Georgian capital, officials condemned the Russian decision as "unconcealed annexation". Their concern was shared by other former Soviet Union countries....

Russia's relations with the west plunged to their most critical point in a generation yesterday when the Kremlin built on its military rout of Georgia by recognising the breakaway provinces of South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent states. Declaring that if his decision meant a new cold war, then so be it, President Dmitri Medvedev signed a decree conferring Russian recognition on Georgia's two secessionist regions. The move flouted UN security council resolutions and dismissed western insistence during the crisis of the past three weeks on respecting Georgia's territorial integrity and international borders. Last night, Medvedev accused Washington of shipping...

Russia's President Dmitry Medvedev has escalated tensions between his country and the West by formally recognising the independence of the Georgian territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Britain has said it "categorically rejects" the decision, which the French foreign ministry has denounced as "regrettable". Georgia's deputy foreign minister described the move as an "unconcealed annexation" of Georgian territory. "I have signed decrees on the recognition by the Russian Federation of the independence of South Ossetia and the independence of Abkhazia," Mr Medvedev said on state television this morning after a vote in the Russian parliament. Western countries have insisted that...

Russia: Rebel Georgian regions are independent MOSCOW, Russia (CNN) -- Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said Tuesday he has signed an order recognizing the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, two breakaway regions in the Republic of Georgia. On Monday, both houses of Russian parliament voted unanimously for such recognition. The Federation Council, the upper chamber, voted 130-0 and the Duma, the lower chamber, voted was 447-0 with three lawmakers absent. That vote was rejected by Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, who called it an attempt by Russia to "justify the occupation" by its forces, which remain in parts of Georgia. U.S....

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has declared that Russia will recognise the independence of Georgia’s breakaway republics of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. He made the announcement in Sochi following a unanimous vote for the republics’ independence by both houses of the Russian Parliament in Moscow on Monday. The leaders of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Sergey Bagapsh and Eduard Kokoity, have reiterated that “they will never agree to remain within Georgia” at an emergency session of the Federation Council. Meanwhile, Georgia has repeatedly said it will never surrender its territories.

TBILISI (AFP) - Russian forces were on Saturday still deployed deep inside Georgia, keeping their grip on a strategic port city, as Moscow brushed aside Western accusations it was failing to abide by a ceasefire deal. ADVERTISEMENT Russia withdrew tanks, artillery and hundreds of troops from the heart of Georgia on Friday, saying it had now fufilled all obligations under a French-brokered agreement aimed at ending the two-week-old conflict. But Russian troops were still controlling access to the western port of Poti and also established a checkpoint just 10 kilometres (seven miles) north of the key city of Gori, AFP...

CRAWFORD, Texas (Reuters) - Russia would violate the ceasefire agreement by setting up checkpoints or permanent facilities in Georgia, the White House said on Saturday as Russian soldiers were seen in the Georgian port city of Poti. ADVERTISEMENT Russia has said it has complied with the ceasefire pact by withdrawing most of its forces but continued to patrol the Georgian port city on the Black Sea and Russian soldiers were manning a checkpoint on the main road into the city but were not stopping traffic. "Putting up permanent facilities and checkpoints are inconsistent with the agreement," said White House spokesman...

The coverage of the Russian-Georgian conflict in the Russian and Western media has an odd "through the looking glass" quality. One side sees naked aggression by Russia toward small, defiant, democratic Georgia; the other sees naked aggression by Georgia toward the tiny separatist region of South Ossetia. Where Western observers tend to see a deplorable failure by the world's democracies to take decisive measures against Russia's bullying, Russian and pro-Russian commentators see blatant anti-Russian prejudice and a concerted effort to weaken Russia. But this is not a situation with two equally valid opposing views of reality, or with roughly balanced...

via translation - Moscow. August 20. INTERFAX.RU - Federation Council Chairman Sergei Mironov said that Russia's upper house of parliament is ready to recognize the independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, for that would be the will of the people of these republics. "The Federation Council is ready to recognize the independent status of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, if people so wish these republics, and if it so decides president of Russia," - told reporters the Federation Council Speaker Sergei Mironov, who arrived in North Ossetia and accompanies a shipment of humanitarian aid, prepared Members of the Federation Council. He...

Excerpt - Russia has denied claims its forces have begun withdrawing from Georgia's breakaway region of South Ossetia. A military commander - Major General Vyachislav Borisov - claimed troops had begun to leave. But a Russian Defence Ministry spokesman said: ""It has not started yet. The question of withdrawal is being considered now and the decision will be taken as the situation in the region is stabilised. "What is going on is probably just preparation, not actual withdrawal." ~ snip ~

Georgia's Foreign Ministry said late Saturday that Russian-backed separatists from the province of Abkhazia have seized a power plant and 13 villages in Georgia. A ministry statement said Russian army units and separtist militants shifted the border of breakaway Abkhazia toward the Inguri River. It says they set up temporary administration in 13 villages and put the Inguri hydropower plant under control. The reports could ot immediately be indepdendently confirmed...........

Statement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Georgia On 16 August 2008 at approximately 4 p.m. local time, armed gangs of the Abkhazian separatist regime together with units of the Russian regular army shifted the administrative border of the Autonomous Republic of Abkhazia towards the Enguri River. This caused the villages of the Zugdidi region Ganmukhuri and Khurcha, villages of the Tsalenjikha region Fakhulani, Tchale, Mujava and Fotskho-Etseri, as well as territory of the Enguri Hydro Power Plant and adjacent villages of Phichori, Otobaia, Nabakevi, Tagiloni, Chuburkhinji, Dikhazurga and Saberio to fall under the occupation of the Russian...

MOSCOW, Aug. 16 -- Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has signed the modified cease-fire agreement with Georgia that U.S. officials say will require Russian troops to immediately return to positions held before hostilities broke out last week. A pull-out, however, will not begin until "extra security measures" ordered by Medvedev are completed, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told reporters, according to the Reuters news agency. "The president issued an order to the relevant authorities to start the adoption of extra security measures envisaged in the six-point plan," he said. "As these security measures are implemented, the withdrawal of forces sent to carry...

Russia cemented gains made in its war with Georgia today when a peace deal, signed by Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, allowed Russian peacekeepers to remain in the separatist regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia and temporarily patrol outside the area.

Russia: After hearing the hard, cold facts of Russia's brutal occupation of Georgia, the West has no choice but to respond harshly to Vladimir Putin's regime. Failure to do so would only invite further attacks. Apologists for Russia say it really had no choice: Because of "genocide" in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, Russia had to intervene. It was an "emergency." It wasn't.

I hope everyone has heard about the war in South Ossetia and Georgia. You probably are convinced by what the media reports, in particular that “Russia is the aggressor against innocent Georgia”. Our government is backing Georgia and also telling us about Russia’s aggression. But that is a lie. I have always made fun of the conspiracy theory people, but I find myself in the same position–criticizing the government and sounding crazy. But I cannot keep quite when such an injustice is going on; so please do not take my words as that of a crazy man who hates America–on...

The leaders of South Ossetia and Abkhazia believe that Georgia’s botched military assault means they now have a better chance than ever of getting international recognition for their independence. Their respective leaders, Eduard Kokoity and Sergey Bagapsh, said they see no need to hold another referendum on their status, since their nations have already expressed their wills. After the meeting with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, the two leaders of the breakaway republics held a news conference in Moscow. (WATCH the media conference) Abkhazian leader Sergey Bagapsh said: “As for our independence and our movement to that goal, no one can...

Russian troops are indiscriminately murdering civilians and interning them in concentration camps, the embattled Georgian president charged yesterday, as he begged the West not to "appease" Moscow as it did with Nazi Germany. The startling accusations came as Russian troops blatantly violated a cease-fire by sending an armored convoy through the strategic city of Gori. The invaders first poured into Georgia five days ago - ostensibly in defense of a pro-Moscow breakaway region, South Ossetia. "What they are doing is exactly what Stalin did to Finland, what they've done to Afghanistan, what in the Second World War Germany was doing...

Reports of a hundred tanks or vehicles headed toward Georgia's interior, breaking per Shep Smith.

President Dmitri Medvedev of Russia said Thursday that Russia would act as an international guarantor of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, the two pro-Russian enclaves at the center of the crisis that have long desired separation from Georgia. As Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice headed to the region for discussions on the crisis and to show support for President Mikheil Saakashvili of Georgia, the Russian position seemed to be a direct challenge to President George W. Bush, who had said the day before that he "insists that the sovereign and territorial integrity of Georgia be respected." In Georgia, meanwhile, Russian forces...

Russia altered the balance of power in Europe when the Kremlin halted its attack on Georgia after its forces had effectively annexed 18 per cent of the country. Russia closed its Five Day War in full control of Georgia's breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, which total more than 4,800 square miles of the neighbouring state. While Russian troops have been deployed in these enclaves since 1992, they have never previously controlled their entire territory. Having achieved this by force, Moscow's terms for a permanent truce would cement its gains. The Kremlin has also demonstrated its indifference to western...

Autonomy and Conflict   Ethnoterritoriality and Separatism in the South Caucasus – Cases in Georgia Svante E. Cornell   Uppsala 2002   Excerpt, pp. 167-170 6.6.3. The War in Abkhazia As mentioned earlier, the Abkhaz and Georgian leadership had managed in late 1991 to agree, though with difficulty, on a consociational scheme for the Abkhaz parliament. And indeed, Abkhazia had been surprisingly calm during the rule of Gamsakhurdia; the fact that the latter, who by late 1991 had shed most the little will to compromise he possessed, agreed to a scheme that granted the Abkhaz heavy over-representation, adds to the...

SENAKI, Georgia: Russia issued an ultimatum to Georgia on Monday to disarm its troops along the boundary with the pro-Russian separatist enclave of Abkhazia as Russian tanks rolled across the internal border and occupied a military base in western Georgia. The move was a sign that fighting could escalate on a second, western front after the conflict initially broke out last week around South Ossetia, the separatist enclave farther east. President Dmitri Medvedev of Russia said its forces had "completed a significant part of the operations to oblige Georgia, the Georgian authorities, to restore peace to South Ossetia," according to...

TBILISI, Georgia — Russia expanded its attacks on Georgia on Sunday, moving tanks and troops through the separatist enclave of South Ossetia and advancing toward the city of Gori in central Georgia, in its first direct assault on a Georgian city with ground forces after three days of heavy fighting, Georgian officials said. The maneuver — along with aerial bombing of the Georgian capital, Tbilisi — suggested that Russia’s aims in the conflict had gone beyond securing the pro-Russian enclaves of South Ossetia and Abkhazia to weakening the armed forces of Georgia, a former Soviet republic and an ally of...

Tbilisi. Georgia accused Russia on Sunday of making "dangerous moves" by asking the UN to withdraw its observers from territory near its breakaway region of Abkhazia. "The Russians have asked the United Nations observers to withdraw their posts from the territory between Abkhazia and Zugdidi district," interior ministry spokesman Shota Utiashvili told AFP. "We observe very dangerous moves in the Abkhaz direction," he said. "The demand itself to withdraw these posts is dangerous."

The conflict in the Caucasus yesterday spread to Georgia's second breakaway province of Abkhazia where separatist rebels and the Russian air force launched an all-out attack on Georgian forces. snip "The operation will enter the next phase as planned. And you will learn about that," he said, adding that he would create a "humanitarian corridor" allowing residents in the district to flee. The offensive appears to mark a dangerous new front in the conflict between Georgia and Russia. snip Georgian interior ministry spokesman Shota Utiashvili said: "They have started the operation to storm Kodori gorge." Asked who was behind the...

Tskhinvali, the capital of the separatist Georgian province South Ossetia, lay in smoldering ruins Sunday after three days of fighting between Georgian troops and Russian forces. Russia's deputy foreign minister said at least 2,000 people, mostly South Ossetians who claim Russian citizenship, have been killed in Tskhinvali. The fighting had spread well beyond South Ossetia, with Russian airstrikes on Georgian cities and with thousands of Russian troops in the breakaway province of Abkhazia. The United States warned Sunday that "disproportionate" actions against Georgia could have a "significant long term impact on U.S.-Russian relations."

GORI, Georgia — The conflict between Russia and the former Soviet republic of Georgia moved toward full-scale war on Saturday, as Russia sent warships to land ground troops in the disputed territory of Abkhazia and broadened its bombing campaign across Georgia. The fighting that had sharply escalated when Georgian forces tried to retake the capital of South Ossetia, a pro-Russian region that won de facto autonomy from Georgia in the early 1990s, appeared to be developing into the worst clashes between Russia and a foreign military since the invasion of Afghanistan in 1979. Shortly before dawn on Sunday, Georgia’s Interior...

"It looks very strongly like the war is escalating both in the region of South Ossetia and now also in Abkhazia," Finnish Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb, who chairs the group, told reporters in Helsinki on Saturday.

EURASIA DAILY MONITOR Volume 5, Issue 123 (June 27, 2008)   GEORGIA HIGH ON THE EU-RUSSIA SUMMIT AGENDA By Vladimir Socor The European Union has decided to make an issue of Russia’s assault on Georgia at the EU-Russia summit in Khanty-Mansiisk on June 26 and 27. This decision, and the surge of attention to Georgia within the EU, are unprecedented and were almost forced on the EU by Moscow’s overt seizure Abkhazia in progress since April. Many West Europeans who previously looked away from the situation are now seriously talking about it, though not yet acting on it. Russia’s...

Georgia's march into South Ossetia has prompted the Abkhazia to begin preparing for war as well. Abkhazian Foreign Minister Sergei Shamba told SPIEGEL ONLINE that his province might open up a second front. SPIEGEL ONLINE: How is Abkhazia reacting to the events in South Ossetia? Shamba: We have a deal with South Ossetia on how we will deal with crisis situations. And we are now planning on implementing it. Our security council met all night and ordered our army to deploy this morning to the Georgian border. SPIEGEL ONLINE: Will a second front now be opened in Abkhazia? Shamba: That...

Russia sent troops and dozens of tanks and armoured vehicles into the breakaway Georgian province of South Ossetia today, vowing to protect its citizens in a move described by Tbilisi's pro-Western Government as an act of war. A South Ossetian rebel minister said that more than 1,000 people had been killed in overnight shelling of the city of Tskhinvali, the separatist capital which Georgia claimed today to have captured. In probably the most serious regional crisis since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, at least 50 Russian tanks – and possibly many more – rumbled through the Roki...

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Russia's deployment of extra troops in the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia has brought the prospect of war "very close", a minister of ex-Soviet Georgia said on Tuesday. Separately, in comments certain to fan rising tension between Moscow and Tbilisi, the "foreign minister" of the breakaway Black Sea region was quoted as saying it was ready to hand over military control to Russia. "We literally have to avert war," Temur Iakobashvili, a Georgian State Minister, told reporters in Brussels. Asked how close to such a war the situation was, he replied: "Very close, because we know Russians...

Vladimir Putin, the outgoing Russian president, on Wednesday accelerated Moscow’s creeping annexation of Georgian territories to sweeping annexation. This is a victory for hardliners who pressed Mr Putin to give the order before he moves from the Kremlin to the Russian White House as prime minister. It comes as Georgian proposals for peaceful settlements in the territories, Abkhazia and South Os­setia, languish. The west must shake off its torpor, condemn Mr Putin’s gambit and support the Georgian proposals. Ignoring Moscow’s Soviet-style land-grab would intensify strife in the south Caucasus. According to Mr Putin’s “instruction”, Russia will open “representations” in the...

Nikoloz Rurua, the deputy chairman of the Georgian parliament's Committee for Defense and Security, says helicopters that attacked the Kodori Gorge came from Russian territory, RFE/RL's Georgian Service reported. Georgia says Russian helicopters fired on the gorge on March 11, which Russia denies. A multinational commission, including the United Nations, the Georgian government, Abkhazia's separatist government, and peacekeepers from the Commonwealth of Independent States, is investigating the incident. "Three helicopters, preliminarily identified as Mi-24 attack gunships, flew [into the Kodori Gorge] from Russian territory or, to be precise, from the territory of Kabardino-Balkaria," Rurua said. "They made a circle above...

Monday, November 20, 2006. Issue 3543. Page 1. U.S., Russia Sign 800-Page WTO Deal By Miriam Elder Russia and the United States on Sunday signed the long-awaited bilateral deal that paves the way for Moscow's entry into the World Trade Organization after 13 years of diplomatic wrangling. Economic Development and Trade Minister German Gref signed the deal with U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab on the sidelines of an Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Vietnam's capital, Hanoi. "This is a historic step -- the last step -- that marks Russia's return to the market principles of the world economy," Gref...

MOSCOW, October 26 (RIA Novosti) - Russia's defense minister highlighted Moscow's concern Thursday that Georgia could try to tackle disputes with the self-proclaimed republics on its territory militarily. Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which proclaimed independence from Georgia in the 1990s, have contributed to tensions in relations between Russia and Georgia, which accuse one another of plans to unleash a new bloody conflict in the region and to annex territory, respectively.

Two weeks after the first wave of Georgian deportations from Russia, Russia has started using Georgia's breakaway region of Abkhazia to deport Georgian citizens, while it is reported that Georgian citizens have to pay USD 1000 to make their way home by this route. Talking to The Messenger head of the interim parliamentary committee on territorial integrity Shota Malashkhia confirmed that Russia is using Abkhazia to deport Georgians. "Zugdidi law enforcement has recorded that Georgians enter the country through breakaway Abkhazia. However I cannot say yet whether it is an official decision of Russian government or not," he told The...

Abkhazia broke away from Georgia after a war in 1992-93, but so far no nation has recognised it. Georgia, entangled in a row with Russia, accuses Moscow of backing Abkhaz separatists. The parliament of Georgia's breakaway region of Abkhazia asked Russia on Wednesday to recognise its independence and openly adopt the role of the Black Sea province's patron. Abkhazia broke away from Georgia after a war in 1992-93, but so far no nation has recognised it. Georgia, entangled in a row with Russia, accuses Moscow of backing Abkhaz separatists. "The People's Assembly of the Republic of Abkhazia has decided to...

Russia and Georgia have opened a new front in their feud over the disputed territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Russian and Georgian envoys traded harsh words at the United Nations. Russia asked the U.N. Security Council Tuesday to condemn Georgia's military activities in its breakaway region of Abkhazia. Vitaly Churkin (file photo) Moscow's U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin circulated a draft Security Council resolution calling on Georgia to withdraw its troops from Abkhazia's disputed Kodori Gorge region. The long-simmering Russia-Georgia tensions erupted last week when Georgia detained four Russian military observers in Tbilisi, accusing them of spying. Russia responded...

TV NZ.co New Zealand Russia refuses to lift Georgia ban Tbilisi, capital city of Georgia Oct 4, 2006 Russia has rejected US and EU calls to lift economic sanctions on Georgia, saying it had cut transport links to curb a dangerous military build-up by its pro-Western neighbour. In unusually strident remarks, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov lashed out at the United States. US support for Georgia had "stimulated" Tbilisi into taking unfriendly steps against Russia, he said. Russia cut rail, air and postal links with the former Soviet republic in response to the arrest of four Russian soldiers on spying...

At a dinner for Western experts and journalists on Sept. 9, President Vladimir Putin of Russia issued a stern warning over impending Western moves to grant a form of conditional independence to Kosovo. He said that Russia would use any such move as a precedent for solutions to the existing "frozen conflicts" in the Georgian autonomous republics of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. These are under de facto Russian military protection, just as Kosovo is under NATO military protection. This is a warning that the West should take extremely seriously. It was in marked contrast to the conciliatory tone of President...

Within the last month Russian-Georgian relations have worsened sharply. A number of hostile actions and gestures from both sides of a political, military and economic nature have escalated the tension. The main objects of the conflict are the republics of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, formally parts of Georgia but de facto independent. While Tbilisi has recently intensified its actions to regain control over both republics, Moscow has threatened Georgia with military intervention should Tbilisi begin an armed operation against the separatists. The situation in the region is so serious at the moment that outbreaks of fighting in both separatist republics...

PRAGUE, July 28, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili has ordered the Abkhaz government in exile to move from Tbilisi to the Kodori Gorge. The move is a bold step toward restoring central control over the breakaway province. The Kodori Gorge, a remote mountain valley in the northeast of Abkhazia, is the only part of the province still controlled by the Georgian authorities. Most of Abkhazia has been ruled independently of Tbilisi since achieving de facto independence in 1993.