Baku Today, Azerbaijan
Feb 6 2005
Separatist ‘minister’ says breakaway ex-Soviet regions united
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AFP 06/02/2005 09:08
BAKU, Feb 5 (AFP) – Breakaway regions in the former Soviet Union have
pledged mutual support in the case of military intervention, the
‘foreign minister’ of a self-proclaimed republic in Georgia said in
an interview published Saturday.
“Our countries have an agreement that will come into effect in case
of war,” Sergei Shamba, the foreign minister of the self-styled
republic of Abkhazia told Azerbaijan’s Echo daily in a front-page
interview.
Nagorno-Karabakh, a breakaway region of Azerbaijan, as well as
Georgia’s two separatist regions Abkhazia and South Ossetia; and
Moldova’s Transdniestr republic, “can act quite effectively”
together, Shamba said.
A series of ethnic conflicts shortly after the collapse of the Soviet
Union led to the breakaway of the regions from the newly independent
states; they have since existed in a legal limbo and are unrecognized
by the outside world.
Shamba did not go into the details of how the outcast regimes would
act in case of an attack but said “the mutual support and solidarity
between our countries is real.”
“When a people rises to fight for its victory and independence, no
force, no matter what military might it has at its disposal, can
quash this determination,” Shamba told Echo.
Three separatist republics in the Caucasus region, Karabakh, Ossetia
and Abkhazia, straddle the route of the four billion dollar BTC
pipeline, which is scheduled to begin pumping Caspian Sea oil to
western markets through Turkey later this year.
Western governments have recently stepped up their efforts to find
settlements for the simmering conflicts, which lend to instability in
the region and inflate the security costs for the BP-led pipeline
project.