Russia 090423 Basic Political Developments

Security talks to be held in Georgia-Ossetia conflict zone

http://news-en.trend.az/politics/foreign/1459857.html

23.04.09 11:45

Georgia, Tbilisi, April 23 /Trend News, N. Kirtskhalia/

The first meeting since the Russia-Georgia conflict will be held in the zone of Georgia-Ossetia conflict in Ergneti on April 23.

The meeting will be held upon the decision of Geneva conference aimed to create mechanisms to prevent incidents in the conflict zone, Georgian Foreign Ministry Analysis and Information Department head Shota Utiashvili said.

Georgian Foreign Ministry, OSCE and EU representatives and representatives of Russian and Ossetian sides will attend the meeting, he said.

"We do not expect anything special from this meeting," Utiashvili said.

Russia, South Ossetia, Georgia & the EU to hold four-sided meeting

http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2.html?NewsID=13865958&PageNum=0

TSKHINVAL, South Ossetia, April 23 (Itar-Tass) - Russia, South Ossetia, Georgia and the European Union will hold a four-sided meeting on Thursday. It will take place in Ergneti, a populated area in the Georgian territory on the border with South Ossetia.

Lieutenant-General Sergei Antonov, the first deputy chief of the general headquarters of the Russian land troops, will take part in the meeting. Representatives of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) will be present as observers of regional stability.

“The meeting will be held within the framework of the Geneva agreements the aim of which is to normalize the situation in an area adjacent to South Ossetia’s border with Georgia and establish closer contacts between representatives of Russia and the European Union, " Antonov emphasized.

He explained that the sides would discuss how to organize regular exchanges of information adn monitoring of the situation in an area adjacent to South Ossetia’s border with Georgia and how to hold briefings on the results of monitoring and find prompt solutions of disputable issues. The representatives of Russia and the European Union will exchange with contact telephone numbers and addresses with an aim to establish close working contacts between EU representatives and the command of the Russian military contingent in South Ossetia.

Lavrov says Russia does not see NATO as a threat

http://en.rian.ru/russia/20090422/121254031.html

LONDON, April 22 (RIA Novosti) - Russia views NATO as a key factor in Euro-Atlantic security, and not as a threat, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said.

"To us, NATO is one of the objective key factors of Euro-Atlantic security, not least security near our borders," Lavrov told the BBC Russian service.

"Russia does not view the North Atlantic Treaty Organization as an inherent source of danger," he said.

However, the diplomat criticized NATO over its policy of enlargement.

"Obviously, Russia cannot ignore the movement of NATO's military infrastructure closer to our borders. The bloc's expansion is being accompanied by the introduction of air patrols, modernization of airports, and the establishment of bases on the territory of newly admitted member states," he said.

He stressed Russia will continue to take all of these factors into account in its foreign policy and military planning, in the interests of ensuring national security.

NATO, Russia to Resume Formal Political Contacts at End of April

http://english.cri.cn/6966/2009/04/23/2041s477645.htm

2009-04-23 01:57:09     Xinhua      Web Editor: Bao Congying

NATO and Russia will resume formal political contacts at the end of April with a meeting of the NATO-Russia Council at ambassadorial level, said the alliance on Wednesday.

The Russians have indicated that they wish to restart formal relations at the NATO-Russia Council at the end of April and that there will be a meeting of foreign ministers during the last two weeks of May, NATO spokesman James Appathurai told reporters.

"If that's the way they wish to do it, then that is the way it will be done," he said.

NATO will also hold open invitation to Moscow for a chief of defense meeting scheduled for the beginning of May, he said.

NATO decided to suspend high-level contacts with Russia in August 2008 following the Russia-Georgia military conflict. NATO foreign ministers in December 2008 agreed to gradually resume political contacts with Moscow.

The alliance on Wednesday also sought to address Moscow's concerns over two military exercises in Georgia in May and June.

The exercises will be attended by 20 countries -- both NATO members and partner countries. Russia was invited to the exercises but refused to participate, said Appathurai. Moscow has been kept informed of the exercises and is welcome to send observers, he said.

"If Russia chooses to send observers, that's something that the alliance will look on quite positively as a way of diminishing any possible misunderstanding or concerns."

He said the exercises, planned in spring 2008, well before the start of the Georgia-Russia military conflict, pose no threat to any country.

Russia's protest against NATO military training in Georgia is element of "exchange" in Moscow-Washington dialogue: experts

http://news-en.trend.az/politics/foreign/1459647.html

23.04.09 08:38

Azerbaijan, Baku, April 22 / Trend News, E. Tariverdiyeva/

Experts say Russia's protests against NATO military training in Georgia is another element of "exchange" in a dialogue between West and Moscow.

"Moscow increases number of negotiating positions with the U.S. as agenda of mutual relations are being formed actively. Sides seek subjects for exchange," Russian expert on security Mikhail Remizov said.

It is planned to hold NATO military training in Georgia, which is striving for the alliance, in early May. NATO planned to involve 1,300 military men from 19 countries to the training and hold them at 20 kilometers east of Tbilisi to improve coordination amongst the alliance members and its partners.

Russia proposed NATO to cancel or postpone military training in Georgia. Russia considers the military training to be provocation in a period of anti-president demonstrations.

"I asked the NATO Secretary General […] to postpone or fully cancel the training," Russian Special Envoy to NATO Dmitriy Rogozin told Reuter and added that Russia is against of NATO training near its borders.

However alliance representatives are not going to cancel military training.

NATO will not refuse to hold military exercises in Georgia in early May, despite Russia's address to cancel or postpone it, NATO Press Secretary Simone De Manso said.

"The exercises have been planned for a long time and it will go ahead as planned," De Manso told Trend News in a telephone conversation from Brussels.

Analysts say Russia's protest against alliance's military training in Georgia is a ground for exchanges with the U.S.

Military training can play a role of trump card in West-Moscow talks, British expert on South Caucasus Ziba Norman said. "There is a genuine need for cooperation with Russia  regarding supply routes for military operations in Afghanistan, and  Russia may have calculated that this can be used as a bargaining tool  in an attempt to prevent the NATO exercises in Georgia," Director of the London-based Transatlantic and Caucasus Studies Institute Norman told Trend News via email.

Remizov said Moscow is increasing number of negotiating positions with the U.S. as agenda of mutual relations are being formed actively. "As a subject for "exchange" the problem of military cooperation with Georgia was more important than even missile defense system in Europe as prospects of military bases in Georgia are more significant for Russia," Russian National Strategy Institute Director Mikhail Remizov told Trend News over telephone from Moscow.

Western observers say Russia's step is also demonstration of regional influence in the Caucasus.

Georgia falls within an area that Russia considers to be its private preserve, an area in which it believes it has the right to assert its influence, Norman said. "Georgia is of greater strategic importance to Russia. The hasty recognition of Abkhazia's independence and the subsequent development of a Russian military presence on the Black Sea coast are clear examples of just how critical Russia believes this region is," Norman said.

"Moscow's protest is part of a strategy to weaken NATO, so if these exercises were to be abandoned then NATO would lose credibility," Norman said.

Russian expert said not military decision of NATO member states, but diplomatic situation is principal in this situation. "Moscow wants the regime in Georgia to be diplomatically out of the zone of military cooperation with the West because this regime does not hide that it is concerned with the possible military revenge," Remizov said. Moscow's protests are simply policy to prevent military cooperation, he said.

E. Ostapenko contributed to the article.