By PAUL BURKHARDT
The Associated Press
Friday, October 13, 2006; 3:52 PM
UNITED NATIONS -- The U.N. Security Council unanimously adopted a resolution Friday that extends the mandate of a U.N. observer mission in Georgia and urges the former Soviet republic to avoid threatening steps in the Russian-backed breakaway region of Abkhazia.
The resolution, which extends the mission until April 15, backed all efforts to settle peacefully the Georgia-Abkhaz conflict and appealed to both side "to refrain from any action that might impede the peace process."
Abkhazia is a Black Sea province that has had de facto independence since 1993, when two years of fighting with Georgian troops ended. Russian troops have been deployed there and it is one of two Georgian regions seeking independence or union with Russia.
The United Nations has maintained an observer mission since 1993 to monitor the cease-fire between Georgia and Abkhazia. It now has about 400 people.
Tension between Tbilisi and Moscow has heightened sharply since Georgia arrested Russia officers on espionage charges last month. Despite their swift release, Russia retaliated with sanctions against its small, southern neighbor, including a transport blockade.
Georgia accuses Russia of backing the separatists in Abkhazia and South Ossetia in a bid to maintain its influence and undermine the government of President Mikhail Saakashvili, who has pledged to rein in the breakaway regions. Last month, Saakashvili flew to Kodori Gorge, a part of Abkhazia controlled by government forces, to rename it Upper Abkhazia to try to reassert control over the region.
The resolution "once again urges the Georgian side to address seriously legitimate Abkhaz security concerns, to avoid steps which could be seen as threatening and to refrain from militant rhetoric and provocative actions, especially in upper Kodori valley."
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov cast the resolution as a triumph for Moscow, saying it "reflected all of Russia's fundamental suggestions" and asserting it "unequivocally" attributed heightened tension between Georgia and Abkhazia to Georgia's "illegal actions in the Kodori Gorge," Russian news agencies reported.
A patrol of the gorge Friday by U.N. observers and Russian forces in Abkhazia as Commonwealth of Independent States peacekeepers turned up a sizable arsenal of weapons and ammunition, as well as 550 Georgian police, according to the commander of the peacekeepers, Maj. Gen. Sergei Chaban.
Lavrov demanded the immediate removal of the weapons and ammunition, the RIA-Novosti news agency reported, and Abkhazia's separatist President Sergei Bagapsh said Abkhazia would not resume negotiations with Georgia on a settlement of their conflict before the "complete withdrawal of Georgian forces and weapons" from the gorge, Interfax reported.
Chaban said Georgian authorities claimed the cache had belonged to forces led by Emzar Kvitsiani, a local militia leader whose refusal to disarm prompted Georgian forces to enter the upper portion of the gorge and take control over the summer in an operation condemned by Russia and Abkhazia.
The Security Council resolution reaffirms the U.N. commitment "to the sovereignty, independence and territorial integrity of Georgia."
Russia's U.N. Ambassador Vitaly Churkin told reporters the main purpose of the resolution is to bring peace to the region.
"It is mostly a resolution calling all the parties to the conflict to go back to (the) negotiating table to work out their difficulties and differences amicably," he said, stressing Russia's "important part in trying to settle that long-standing conflict."
The United States had opposed the Russian draft but U.S. Ambassador John Bolton said an agreement was reached during a conversation between Lavrov and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.