Georgian-South Ossetian Conflict. Background

Present-day Ossetians, descended from the Scythians, Sarmatians and Alanians, have historically lived in the Caucasus side by side with the Georgians while preserving their ethnic and linguistic identity. The Ossetian language belongs to the Iranian group of the Indo-European family of languages, and the Georgian language belongs to the Cartvelian group, whose origin is still being disputed by scholars. As we know, the State of Alania (Ossetia) existed as early as the 9th century. The ancestors of present-day Ossetians adopted Christianity in the early Middle Ages.

When the Kuchuk-Kainarji Peace Treaty of 1774 made the Caucasus part of the Russian Empire, it started helping the Transcaucasian peoples in their fight for liberation from the Ottoman rule. That was when the incorporation of united Ossetia into the Russian Empire took start. Until 1917 the Ossetian people had no problems developing their national institutions because they were not separated by any administrative borders.

SOUTH OSSETIA BETWEEN FREEDOM AND INDEPENDENCE

After the Revolution of 1917 and the Civil War, which brought about the demise of the Russian Empire, South Ossetians found themselves between new Russia and the self-proclaimed Georgian Democratic Republic. Indicatively, the atomistic Georgian principalities appealed to the Russian Crown for protection as early as 1783 to consciously reject independent foreign policies. In the 19th century, the Russian government established an administrative system in which Georgia and South Ossetian lands became part of the Transcaucasian Vicegerency as two provinces, the Tiflis and the Kutaisi, while North Ossetian lands fell under the jurisdiction of the North Caucasian Military Administration. The two Georgian provinces proclaimed independence in 1917.

The Government of South Ossetia, responding to the popular wish to preserve the unity of Ossetia, asked to be annexed to Russia: “We repeat and confirm the unbending will of the people of South Ossetia expressed in 1917: South Ossetia as a historical entity is an inalienable part of Russia.”1
 

The question of South Ossetia becoming part of Russia was put on the agenda of the Transcaucasian Revolutionary Committee on May 21, 1921. However, as it was announced on behalf of Joseph Stalin, then People’s Commissar (minister) of Nationalities in the Bolshevik Government, the issue could not be discussed because “due to general political interests South Ossetia should temporarily remain part of Georgia.”2

The same meeting issued a Declaration on the Independence of the Abkhaz Soviet Socialist Republic, while offering South Ossetia the status of an autonomous region vested with the rights of a republic. That decision forced South Ossetia’s leadership to make a decision on the creation of a South Ossetian Soviet Socialist Republic. Plans of the republic’s border and the Constitution of South Ossetia were developed. These plans were later incorporated, in a truncated way, in the first Georgian Constitution of 1922. The Georgian Constitution sealed the autonomy of South Ossetia and stated that “the South Ossetian Autonomous Region shall have the same rights as the Abkhaz and Adzhar Autonomous Republics.” In 1937, the issues of the rights of autonomous entities were put under the jurisdiction of the USSR Government under the Soviet Constitution of 1936.3 By the time of the break-up of the USSR Ossetians firmly believed that the inclusion of South Ossetia into a new entity created by the Bolsheviks in 1922, Soviet Georgia, by decision of the Caucasus Bureau of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) had no legal grounds and amounted to a forcible annexation and a seizure of foreign territory by Georgia.

South Ossetia being part of the Georgian SSR between 1922 and 1990 can be seen as a de facto situation. But the decision was never recognised by the population of South Ossetia during that period, as witnessed by numerous protests in 1926, 1934, 1944, 1949, 1958 and 1974, which were followed by reprisals.

THE FATE OF SOUTH OSSETIANS AFTER THE BREAK-UP OF THE USSR

The Georgian-South Ossetian conflict was an internal conflict within the USSR and after its disintegration became an international conflict for Russia. A new confrontation broke out over the state programme introducing the Georgian language as the official language on the territory of the South Ossetian autonomy, as well as a new demographic policy that universally infringed upon the rights of non- Georgians.4 From the beginning of 1988 a sweeping purge of non-Georgians from South Ossetia’s law enforcement agencies was launched on ethnic grounds. Non-Georgians were dismissed and Georgians from other regions of Georgia were hastily appointed in their place. Within a short period of time the Georgian media carried several hundred publications that were insulting to the national dignity of Ossetians, Abkhazians, Russians and other non-Georgian people. The Georgian authorities were clearly committed to creating a monoethnic state discriminating against national minorities living in Georgia. Dismissals, attacks, burglaries and kidnapping became accepted instruments of the authorities which pursued the goal that was later expressed in then Georgian President Zviad Gamsakhurdia’s famous slogan, “Georgia for the Georgians”.

These actions triggered protest rallies by non-Georgians: Abkhazians, Ossetians, Armenians, Azerbaijanis and Russians. The Ossetians who lived in the hinterland parts of Georgia and were exposed to various forms of discrimination by the Georgian officialdom sent collective appeals to the leaders of South Ossetia, to the Supreme Soviet of the USSR and international organisations begging to be protected against Georgian nationalists’ attacks. In 1991, after the collapse of the Soviet Union and newly acquired Georgia’s independence, one of the first steps taken by President Gamsakhurdia was to abolish South Ossetia’s and Abkhazia’s autonomy.

The Ossetians opposed the decision and offered resistance to the Georgian authorities. A military clash between Georgia and South Ossetia claimed many victims. After the armed conflict, which lasted until 1992, Georgia lost control over the territory, and a joint peacekeeping force consisting of Russian, Ossetian and Georgian battalions under the flag of the Joint Peacekeeping Forces entered the conflict zone. The status was sealed by the July 1992 Sochi Agreement between the Russian Federation and Georgia, with the agreement of the leaders of North Ossetia (a republic within Russia) and South Ossetia.

HOW THE SETTLEMENT PROCESS WENT ON

The Georgian-South Ossetian conflict was managed by the sides with Russia’s mediation and the participation of the Republic of North Osse- tia-Alania and the OSCE. The Memorandum on Security and Confidence Building Measures between the sides signed on May 16, 1996 is not only a legal, but an important political act that commits the parties to seeking a “political settlement”.

The document fully complied with present-day international practice of concluding informal interim agreements on confidence measures adopted by parties to the conflict once hostilities end but before a political settlement is attempted. In the event, the specific goal of the Memorandum was to provide extra moral and political guarantees of non-resumption of hostilities that ended in July 1992 under the Sochi Agreement. One of the merits of the Memorandum is that its provisions are tied in with the UN Charter and the basic principles and decisions of the OSCE. This is confirmed, in particular, by Section 1 of the memorandum’s resolution whereby “the parties to the conflict renounce the use or threat of force, political, economic and other forms of pressure against each other.”

Because the principle of the non-use of force, as expressly stated in Section 4, Article 2 of the UN Charter, is established in international relations, the fact that this commitment is central to the text of the Memorandum may indicate an indirect recognition, above all by the immediate parties to the conflict, of the fact that their relations have transcended the scope of relations within a single state. In other words, these relations could no longer be protected against international involvement by the principle of non-interference. An important confidence measure, under the Memorandum, was the development of functional cooperation  both between law enforcement agencies and more broadly between “representatives of Georgian and Ossetian political and non-governmental organisations, scientists and representatives of the Russian Federation and other countries.” All that created good prerequisites for the settlement of the conflict. However, Georgia failed to avail itself of the opportunities presented by these international legal documents.

An escalation followed Mikheil Saakashvili’s election as the President of Georgia. He openly declared regaining control over the “unrecognised republics” of Abkhazia and South Ossetia by the force of arms as his goal. A new round of the conflict was triggered by the hegemonistic behaviour of the Georgian elite and leadership, who brutally suppressed any dissent. As a result, no progress was made in the settlement process and a new round of armed confrontation started.

1 Memorandum of South Ossetian Working People of May 28, 1920/ South Ossetian Research Institute (YONII)    Archive, Fund 20, List 104, P.13. 
2 L. Chibirov. Caucasus periodical press on Ossetia and the Ossetians. Books 1-2. Tskhinval, 1985. 
3 V. Margiyev. On the legal status of the South Ossetian Autonomous Region. 1990, p. 20. 
4 State Programme of the Development of the Georgian Language// the newspaper Sakartvelo, September 30,    1988.

Below is a selected chronology of the steps Georgia took in recent decades to
“rein in” the people of South Ossetia:

5 Zviad Gamsakhurdia.On Aggression Against the Ossetians //The Stolichnayanewspaper. 1990, No.1

“Restoring constitutional order” repeatedly attempted by Georgia at various historical junctures could not have been successful for the simple reason that it was never aimed at the restoration of normal life for all the people on the territory of South Ossetia. The actions of the Georgian authorities, both after Georgia’s independence and indeed during the Soviet period, were marked by the suppression and often extermination of non-Georgian population, violation of their rights and freedoms and a reluctance to grant equal opportunities guaranteed under the Constitution. Therefore such actions can only be assessed as unconstitutional.

However, as August 2008 has shown, the ruling regime in Georgia has failed to learn the lessons of history. The military aggression unleashed by President Saakashvili testified yet again to the inhumane nature of Georgia’s policies with regard to South Ossetia and demonstrated to the international community that the Georgian leadership has not learnt any other methods of resolving conflicts except through the use of force.