For Abkhazia, a 'Special' Independence Day
This Year, Russia And Nicaragua Back the Region

By Tara Bahrampour
Washington Post Foreign Service
Wednesday, October 1, 2008

SUKHUMI, Georgia, Sept. 30 -- Fifteen years ago this week, flames shot out the windows of the parliament building and the final battle of a separatist war raged over this seaside city. When it was over, the Georgian army had retreated and several hundred thousand ethnic Georgians had fled. Since then, the inhabitants of this 3,300-square-mile spit of subtropical coastline and snowcapped mountains have considered Sept. 30 their independence day.

On Tuesday, for the first time, they weren't the only ones to think so.

After war broke out between Russia and Georgia in August, Russia recognized the independence of the breakaway Georgian regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The move, seconded by Nicaragua, set off international criticism but delighted the Abkhaz, who argue that they have long functioned as a separate state with their own government and army, albeit with borders secured by Russian peacekeepers.

"This is a special parade, a unique parade," said Timur Nadaraia, 39, a former commander in the 1992-93 war who watched tanks and personnel carriers rumble by as spectators waved Abkhazian flags. "This is the year that our independence was recognized by Russia and Nicaragua. . . . We've achieved our goal."

This summer's international standoff over Georgia's disputed regions has yet to be resolved. A cease-fire agreement in which Russia promised to pull its troops back to their positions before Aug. 7, when war started in South Ossetia, has been complicated by Moscow's recognition of the breakaway states. An area of Abkhazia previously under Georgian control will not be returned to Georgia, Abkhaz officials say.

They also say they will not admit European Union monitors who, according to the agreement, must be allowed in all of Georgian territory. "They won't be here," said Sergei Shamba, foreign affairs minister, in an interview Monday. "We categorically refuse the observers on our territory. They're not needed here."

He added that Abkhazia would consider allowing Russian military bases on its territory, in exchange for "the promise that there will no longer be war here."

Many here insist that they have achieved genuine independence and that this tiny state will not be folded into the Russian Federation, as some predict.

"It will never happen," said Hamida Shamba, 20, an economics student at Abkhazia State University who posed for pictures draped in the Abkhaz flag -- green and white stripes and a red box depicting a hand and seven stars. "We haven't even considered that thought."

Zarime Bariamov, who was selling rosaries at an outdoor market, was less categorical. "Now, you look at the street and you see what's going on and you can see that we're going to be subordinate to Russia," she said. "We want that. It'll be calmer then."

Shamba, the foreign minister, noted that Russia is a major investor here; Abkhazia uses the Russian ruble and has no plans to issue its own currency, he said.

On the streets this week, red-white-and-blue Russian flags hung alongside Abkhaz ones, and celebrators toasted their giant neighbor as a friend and savior. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev's statement of recognition was reprinted in newspapers and Moscow's mayor, Yuri Luzhkov, was a prominent speaker at an official ceremony Monday.

Other guests included representatives from Russian regions such as Daghestan and Kursk and from other disputed post-Soviet territories such as South Ossetia, Nagorno-Karabakh and Transdniester, some wearing tall fleece hats with their business suits.

Also present was a delegation from the German-Abkhazian Association, a private German organization that seeks to promote interest in Abkhazia. "It's the Cote d'Azur of . . . the Soviet Union," said Philipp Ingel, a member from Berlin who said the group was looking into rehabilitating a castle here that was once owned by German aristocrats.

The capital of Abkhazia is an eerily empty city, lined with stately, peeling, Czarist-era villas and lush foliage. The Black Sea laps at its expansive bays, and huge eucalyptus trees perfume the air. Russian is the main language, although Abkhazian is also widely spoken.

People in Georgia actively mourn the loss of this beloved vacation spot, and some -- including many in government -- still talk of "when," not "if" they get Abkhazia back. Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili has made reintegrating the territories one of the keystones of his rule.

But it is hard to find anyone here who believes Georgia has the right to claim Abkhazia. They cite history stretching from the 10th century to the Soviet era to support the idea of Abkhazia as a country. While many say they lived peacefully alongside their Georgian neighbors until the 1992-93 war, they also say they cannot forgive the Georgians for the deaths and injuries it caused.

This summer's war in South Ossetia brought back memories of that war. Tanya Abgadzhaba, 41, of Gudauta, said she was worried that young people such as her two sons, who are 18, and 20, would be called to fight. "It was like living on a volcano," she said of the constant fear that war would reignite with Georgia. Since the Russian recognition, she said, "I feel more secure."

Besides showcasing the Abkhaz army, Tuesday's parade included a brigade of Cossacks with large moustaches, red capes and ceremonial daggers who said they had fought with the Russian army last month in Georgia. When the parade ended, they gathered under some trees, passed around sausages and plastic cups of vodka, and pontificated on what it means to be Cossack.

"Cossacks don't fight with anybody, they defend people," said Sergei Zaoruliko, 48. "We're always going to defend our way of life, our children, our traditions, our songs."

Defend them from whom? "From NATO," said Roma Kavalyov, 38.

Inside the former parliament building, a burned-out 12-story edifice that stood as the backdrop for the parade, Ainar Gamisonia, 16, stood at a hole where a window had been, and smoked a cigarette. Born during the war, he said he didn't know much about what happened in the building, but when war started in South Ossetia this summer, he was ready to go to the Georgian front.

"With my classmates and my older brother, we got together to go there, to Gali, to help our elders, whatever was needed," he said. "Our fathers, our grandfathers, our ancestors taught us how to use guns."

"We don't want to leave our borders," he said. "We just didn't want them to come in."