Georgia-Russia Geneva talks: More words than action? (Feature)

By Shabtai Gold Jul 28, 2009, 5:04 GMT

Geneva ­ When talks between Russia and Georgia started in Geneva shortly after the end of their war last August, negotiators did not plan to work out a comprehensive peace deal or even tackle the root causes of the conflict.

They set the bar lower, but within what they believed to be their reach. A year and six rounds of talks later, little political progress is visible and expectations are low.

Moscow is demanding recognition of Georgia's breakaway regions, South Ossetia and Abkhazia, as independent, to reach humanitarian and security deals.

The United States, a party to the Geneva talks, and the last major Western backer of Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, seems frustrated with Russia. With numerous other matters to take up with Moscow, Georgia cannot be the top priority.

Washington has also moved its top negotiator off the Geneva file and a second senior US official is also likely to be switched to another matter.

'I think Geneva, for one year, has proved a place at least where all the actors meet, but thats the end of it. We have not seen anything moving,' said Alain Deletroz of the International Crisis Group, an independent think-tank.

The European Union, the Organization for Security Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) and the United Nations, the three parties chairing negotiations, however, say just keeping a forum for dialogue open is crucial.

The OSCE and the UN have lost their observer missions to the Caucuses and only the EU team is left, but without access to the self-declared states.

While there have been few serious incidents of late, and a war of attrition has been avoided, the situation is tense.

We won't see Abkhazia and South Ossetia being reintegrated into Georgia,' Andre Liebich of the Geneva Graduate Institute in Switzerland said.

But there are possibilities for making life better, from the perspective of humanitarian issues,' he added.

Security cooperation is weak and incident prevention still not formalized. Refugees are unable to settle back in the breakaway regions, while water systems are dilapidated.

If the sides hoped to increase stability and solve some humanitarian issues as a stepping stones to solving larger problems, the process so far has yielded limited results.

As time passes, the de-facto situation on the ground, with over 250,000 refugees from two wars stuck and the two breakaways acting as unrecognized but independent republics, seems to be cemented, as long as nothing disrupts the status quo.

The leaders of South Ossetia and Abkhazia have at times shown streaks of independence from Moscow. In closed door meetings with envoys they confessed that the Russians were limiting their agendas and possibly chipping away at their legitimacy in the eyes of the local population.

The spats have also come out in Geneva, until recently. One frustrated Western diplomat walked out of a meeting, groaning that it was impossible to understand who was running the show. Another noted that during negotiations, even a Russian diplomat seemed perplexed by his allies.

'The Russians' ploy to get these countries recognized is stalled,' said Liebich. Russia must rethink its strategy.'

He suggests moving the thorniest political issue out of the way, by having all sides agree that no action, whether humanitarian or monitoring, in any way implies recognition or non-recognition of the states, allowing progress to be made.

The limitations of Russias might are clear, as even its partners within Central Asia refused to set up diplomatic ties with the breakaways. Also, Moscow desires calm and stability, worried about other tensions in the Caucasus and the upcoming Olympic Games, and won't push a military gambit.

Tbilisi, under Saakashvili, will not change its tone but cannot launch an attack, and continues to try to paint Russia as the aggressor, a portrait Moscow despises.

'For the moment, we have to live with it and reduce tensions. Its too early to talk of an end game status acceptable for all parties,' said Deletroz.

The next round of talks, the only game around, is scheduled to begin in September.