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Monday,
August 13,
2007, #153 (1420)
Tbilisi's conflict resolution policy is, apparently, one of discos. That's what President Saakashvili told Georgian teens this weekend at the country's newest youth patriot camp, plunked squarely in the Georgian-controlled portion of the Abkhazian conflict zone. "The noise of their helicopters will be overshadowed by our new hit songs, dancing, by our relationships and our optimism," the president announced to the crowd, before posing for photos and playing table tennis with young campers. His government, the rousing promise was, would build nice things like roads and discos to convince the Abkhaz separatists to lay down their arms and rejoin Georgia. The condescendingly simplistic rhetoric may be questionable, but of real concern is the location of the camp-upper Kodori Gorge, the only Tbilisi-controlled part of Abkhazia and the scene of plenty of violence in recent years. Georgia's youth patriot camps, eye-rolling affairs combining bored teenagers and anthem-tooting nationalism, dot the country and rarely make waves. But another one became a center of controversy earlier this summer after being set up in Ganmukhuri, less than a kilometer from the border with separatist-controlled Abkhazia. Last month, the UN Secretary General's Abkhazia report called on Tbilisi to do away with the Ganmukhuri camp. The 'cultural activities' there (which, one camper told an IWPR correspondent, include shouting rallying cries like 'Long live united Georgia!' and 'We will return!') could lead to "misunderstanding, miscalculation and subsequent violence," scolded the report, telling the two sides to keep to opposite sides of the playground. "A separation of opposing forces is the primary and often the most effective guarantee of the preservation of peace," the report reminded. Tbilisi had its fingers in its ears. Speaker of Parliament Nino Burjanadze visited Ganmukhuri as the report was released, where she made it clear that the summer camp wasn't going anywhere. The UN, she suggested, didn't have its facts straight. The government thumbing its nose at the UN may score some points with voters who feel Georgia is being let down by the international community, but it's an unusual choice for an administration keen to cozy up to the West. Saakashvili's team must be awfully confident in their strategy to regain the secessionist territories. And it's going well so far. The new camp in Upper Abkhazia is meant, in part, to contrast the dead-end tactics of force with peaceful economic development and youthful optimism. Georgia is a country of hope, the message goes, and Abkhazia would do well to join hands with it. The timing puts everything into stark relief. A youth camp was talked about last year as the Abkhazian government-in-exile migrated to the barely-accessible upper Kodori Gorge (made possible by an armed government response to a rebel uprising there), and this summer's opening was probably planned months ago. But with missiles falling out of the sky, now is a good time for Saakashvili to parade singing adolescents as a show of national unity. But those children are in a conflict zone. While the odds of actual misfortune may be slim, this was an area bombarded by rocket fire in the spring. Not many parents can be eager to bundle little Giga off to the Kodori Gorge this August. "Youth energy can confront any kind of violence," the president said. Maybe, but should it? The administration's
quickly-progressing plan to win over the secessionist territories-parallel
governments and making life in Georgia look nicer than life out of it-is
sound. But deploying Georgian teens as an advance guard not only in
a PR campaign, but in a physical one, is a reckless and cynical step. |
Careful,
lest they burn down the disco-youth camp a reckless presence in Upper
Abkhazia