 Georgian troops were ousted from South Ossetia in August
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Russia has asked Nato to cancel or postpone military exercises that it plans to hold in Georgia next month.
Moscow’s envoy to Nato, Dmitry Rogozin, described the exercises, expected to involve 1,300 troops from 19 countries, as “absurd and a provocation”.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said the exercises would not help develop stability in the Caucasus.
Nato says the exercises were planned before last year’s conflict between Russia and Georgia over South Ossetia.
Georgia hopes eventually to join Nato, a move strongly opposed by Russia, which says the alliance’s eastward expansion is a threat to its security.
‘Impossible’
Nato said the exercises, to be held some 20km (12 miles) east of Georgia’s capital Tbilisi from 6 May to 1 June, would be non-aggressive and based on a fictitious UN-mandated, Nato-led crisis response operation.
“There should really be no element of surprise for anyone,” Nato spokesman Robert Pszczel said. “There is no heavy armour involved at all, it’s just people.”
But Russia’s ambassador to the military alliance dismissed the claim.
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“This is absurd and a provocation,” Mr Rogozin told the Reuters news agency. “I have asked the Nato Secretary General [Jaap de Hoop Scheffer]… to postpone these exercises or to cancel them.”
Mr Rogozin said military co-operation between Russia and Nato was still frozen as a result of last summer’s South Ossetia conflict and that Moscow’s position would not change before a forthcoming ministerial meeting in May.
He also rejected Nato’s argument that the exercises had been planned last year.
“A war is a ‘force majeure’,” he said. “To hold military exercises in a country where a war has just ended is impossible.”
The ambassador also said the exercises could be exploited by Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili in his stand-off with opposition parties, which have recently held a series of mass protests.
The opposition accuses him of mishandling the war with Russia, during which Georgia’s attempts to regain control of the breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia were repelled by Russian forces.
Under an EU-sponsored ceasefire, monitors were sent to Georgia. But thousands of Russian troops remain in both breakaway regions.
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See also:
Russia Urges NATO to Call Off Georgia Exercises
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/article/1010/42/376285.htm
Russia’s Lavrov criticizes NATO over plans for drills in Georgia
http://en.rian.ru/world/20090416/121159598.html
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Full article and photo: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8002429.stm
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