More on that self-proclaimed independent EU-sponsored Report on the 2008 Georgia conflict.

Points of interest from it, as they come:

The Mission had no access to intelligence reports: a serious setback, I’d say. Not least since the whole business was launched because of what Georgia + Washington ‘really’ thought Moscow was up to, and vice versa.

It has some oddly psychobabble-type passages:

After fighting has ended there is a sad record of killings and other losses, of intense suffering, of dreams and hopes that were shattered, in many cases forever.

… We will come to know that all sides involved in the conflict had their grievances, that their actions had origins in their experience and memory, and that most of those taking part thought that what they did had to be done. In a close look at the peoples´ motives we shall understand their aspirations, even when we are not able to accept the means.

Understanding the people will lead us to the facts.

Hmm. Or not.

The wave of newly-found self-consciousness that followed political changes in Georgia since the end of 2003 clashed with another wave of assertiveness emanating from the Russian Federation, which tried to establish a privileged zone of interest in its “near abroad”, where developments and events thought to be detrimental to Russia´s interests were not easily accepted.

Fair enough. Solid passages on the long history of Georgian/Russian and other rivalries in and around the region.

Georgian policies latterly did not go down well with Russia and its new assertiveness in post-Soviet space. That word ‘assertiveness’ maybe does not quite capture the work of the new/old KGB?

EU ‘caution’ in getting involved in the region is well summarised. Again ‘caution’ is perhaps too polite? Oops, the EU are paying for this Report!

The report is unambiguous about Russia’s mass passportisation’ policies (ie Moscow issuing huge numbers of passports to people living in Georgia to pump up the argument that Russian citizens needed ‘defending’):

The mass conferral of Russian citizenship to Georgian nationals and the provision of passports on a massive scale on Georgian territory, including its breakaway provinces, without the consent of the Georgian Government runs against the principles of good neighbourliness and constitutes an open challenge to Georgian sovereignty and an interference in the internal affairs of Georgia.

Who started the fighting? Not easy to say? But:

There is the question of whether the use of force by Georgia in South Ossetia, beginning with the shelling of Tskhinvali during the night of 7/8 August 2008, was justifiable under international law. It was not…

There is also no evidence to support any claims that Russian peacekeeping units in South Ossetia were in flagrant breach of their obligations under relevant international agreements such as the Sochi Agreement and thus may have forfeited their international legal status. Consequently, the use of force by Georgia against Russian peacekeeping forces in Tskhinvali in the night of 7/8 August 2008 was contrary to international law.

But Russia’s disproportionate response too was out of order, on numerous counts (including the fact that as a neighbour Russia had special responsibilities to act in a restrained way):

…it must be concluded that the Russian military action outside South Ossetia was essentially conducted in violation of international law.

Russia claimed that Georgia was committing genocide against its ethnic minorities:

the Mission concludes that to the best of its knowledge allegations of genocide committed by the Georgian side in the context of the August 2008 conflict and its aftermath are

But there was evidence of deliberate ethnic cleansing directed against Georgians.

Could it all have been avoided?

Notwithstanding the real or perceived interests of the third parties, one of weaknesses of the peace processes in South Ossetia and Abkhazia in 1992 – 2006 seemed to be the fact that the Georgian, Abkhaz and South Ossetian sides concentrated heavily on external aspects and players without paying sufficient attention to building mutual trust and promoting reconciliation.

Very true. And with the EU being busily cautious, Russia’s involvement as neighbour and peacekeeper and having its own ‘interests’ became large and contradictory:

In the view of many Georgians, the Russian policy, especially from 2004 onwards – including the formalising of links with the breakaway territories, the granting of Russian passports to their populations, and declarations about using the Kosovo precedent as a basis for the recognition of South Ossetia and Abkhazia – was more concerned with the protection of its own interests than with the assumption of its responsibility as an honest broker..

The lack of timely and sufficiently determined action by the international community, and to some degree the non-innovative approach to the peace process adopted by international organisations, contributed to the unfolding crisis. Thus a series of mistakes, misperceptions and missed opportunities on all sides accumulated up to a point where the danger of an explosion of violence became real.

The Report tries to sum up:

It must also take into account years of provocations, mutual accusations, military and political threats and acts of violence both inside and outside the conflict zone. It has to consider, too, the impact of a great power’s coercive politics and diplomacy against a small and insubordinate (Note: what?!) neighbour, together with the small neighbour’s penchant for overplaying its hand and acting in the heat of the moment without careful consideration of the final outcome, not to mention its fear that it might permanently lose important parts of its territory through creeping annexation…

Overall, the conflict is rooted in a profusion of causes comprising different layers in time and actions combined. While it is possible to identify the authorship of some important events and decisions marking its course, there is no way to assign overall responsibility for the conflict to one side alone. They have all failed, and it should be their responsibility to make good for it.

It makes some recommendations (yes, several of which mean you, Russia):

No party to the conflict or party which is considered to be strongly supportive of any of the sides should assume a position of command, or chair, or arbiter nor exercise any other control of an operation which rests on the notion of impartiality and even-handedness in order to be effective…

It should not be accepted that the political culture of cooperativeness in international relations in and for Europe, as it had developed first in the CSCE and later in the OSCE contexts, be eroded…

Political concepts and notions such as privileged spheres of interest or otherwise laying claim to any special rights of interference into the internal or external affairs of other countries are irreconcilable with international law. They are dangerous to international peace and stability and incompatible with friendly relations among States. They should be rejected.

To sum up? Not a bad effort in the modest and cautious circumstances.

The Russians can make a loud play of the fact that ‘Georgia started it’.

Georgia can point to numerous very explicit findings that Russia was in serious breach of international law, not least via that energetic passportisation policy which applies elsewhere in the CIS area.

But (in my view) the Report lacks the courage of its convictions:

  • It underplays the deep psychological and aggressive aspects of Russian Sovietish ‘assertiveness’.
  • And, for good measure, it does not get into the vital issue of how far the Americans might have led the Georgians to think that with the Olympic Games going on a tough military lunge against the separatist elements really would work.
  • Nor does it do justice to the fact that for all sorts of reasons (on the whole bad ones), EU governments since 1991 have been content to put CIS-area issues into the Too Tricky box, thereby leaving Russia to be ‘assertive’ as and when it suits.
  • Last but not least, it does not look at the way in which the different parties interpreted the Kosovo precedent(s), whatever they might have deemed them to be. Perhaps, again, because to do that would be Just Too Embarrassing for the EU?

In short?

Unless and until the EU stops messing about and decides that all European countries in the CIS are eligible and welcome to join, issues such as Georgia will be prey to dark post-Soviet forces who hate Europe and pluralism.

The more so if the EU is too ‘cautious’ in committing non-trivial resources to these regions, while zealous about plunging in Sarkozy-style to show off after things have lurched badly for the worse.

Oh, and FCO and other EU Foreign Ministries: when your own senior people experts in both regions warn you that decisions taken in one policy area (say Kosovo/Serbia) could create a huge mess in some other policy areas (say Georgia/Russia/CIS), do try to listen – and think.