Re: Information on the status of refugees in Georgia and Abchasia

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From: MINELRES moderator <[email protected]>
Date: Fri, 19 Feb 1999 19:45:17 +0200 (EET)
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Subject: Re: Information on the status of refugees in Georgia and Abchasia

From: MINELRES moderator <[email protected]>

Original sender: William McKinney <[email protected]>

Re: Information on the status of refugees in Georgia and
Abchasia


Dear Viona,
 
Here is some general background information to answer your question on
the attitude taken by Georgians towards people that fled Abkhazia
during the civil war of 1993. I quote directly from the report:
 
Forced Migration: Repatriation in Georgia (1995)
http://www.soros.org/fmp2/html/georgia.htm
 
"The presence of as many as 280,000 IDPs from its secessionist regions
is an increasing source of political and economic tension in Georgia.
The shabby hotels of Tbilsi are bursting with IDPs from Sukhumi,
compounding the existing burden from thousands of ethnic Georgians
displaced by the fighting in 1991 and 1992 during South Ossetia's bid
for independence. Few of them have found work in the morass of
Georgia's economic collapse. Most of them have sold whatever
possessions they escaped with in order to buy a few basic goods.
 
The Georgian government and international organizations have provided
IDPs with basics, including a much coveted supply of electricity and
heat. This has stirred resentment among Tbilsi's permanent residents,
who spent much of last winter bundled up in dark apartments without
heat, hot water or cooking gas. Those who could installed small
wood-burning stoves in their homes, but the majority subsisted on
whatever cold food they could afford.
 
Not only are the IDPs a drain on Georgia's strapped economy, but they
are a constant reminder of the military defeats in Abkhazia and South
Ossetia. More importantly, they are a symbolic warning that the
struggle to maintain a unitary state is not over, and that Eduard
Shevardnazde may not be winning. Georgian nationalists excoriate
Shevardnadze for losing South Ossetia and Abkhazia, and advocate the
hard line of never ceding an inch of Georgian territory to the leaders
of these republics.
 
This uncompromising stand is supported by Georgians far and wide, who
invariably argue that the two republics have not been sufficiently
grateful for all the language rights and autonomy measures granted
them by the Tbilisi government during the Soviet period. Rebutting the
Abkhaz argument, Georgians invoke their own historical facts to prove
that Georgia's claim to this territory dates to antiquity. Given the
intransigence of Georgians over this issue, the only durable solution
entertained has been prompt resettlement in Abkhazia.
 
Local integration, an alternative solution sometimes advocated by
UNHCR, has not been discussed seriously, even though the IDPs in
western Georgia belong to the same ethnic group (Mengrelian) and get
along well with their local hosts. According to NGOs in the field,
after more than two years of displacement, many of these IDPs have
achieved some degree of integration by attrition. Openly considering a
policy of large-scale local integration would be seen as the
abandonment of territory to the Abkhaz, and this is unthinkable for
Shevardnazde's political survival."
 
Best regards,
 
William McKinney
Librarian
*********************************************
European Centre for Minority Issues
William McKinney
Librarian
Schiffbruecke 12
D-24939 Flensburg, Germany
 
e-mail: [email protected]
http://www.ecmi.de
 
Tel: +49 461 1414970
Fax: +49 461 1414969
*********************************************

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