Georgia denounced Russian-South Ossetian military merger as unacceptable and illegitimate

Tbilisi has decried Russia president’s March 14 order for his government to get down to hammering out an agreement with South Ossetia, Georgia’s breakaway republic, on incorporating some of the latter’s army units into the Russian armed forces.

“Any move that aims at annexing our territory, now occupied, is unacceptable to us,” said chairman of the Georgian parliament Irakli Kobakhidze.

Georgia’s foreign minister Mikhail Janelidze said the international community needed to speak up against the ‘illegitimate’ agreement.

The Georgian opposition has accused the government of not trying hard enough to attract the international community’s attention to ‘Russian transgressions’ on the Georgian territory. “The Georgian authorities have been doing nothing, and the result of it is that Georgia has faded from [the international community’s] agenda,” said Sergo Ratiani of the European Georgia party’s parliamentary faction. “This is at a time sanctions have been imposed on Russia because of Ukraine.”

Ex deputy minister of defense Batu Kutelia said president Putin’s decree raised the risk of a new aggression against Georgia.

The plan for the Russian and South-Ossetian armies to merge is part of an Agreement on cooperation and integration signed by Moscow and Tskhinvali in 2015.

The opinions, expressed in the report, reproduce the author’s terminology and views and not necessarily reflect the position of the editorial staff