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Georgia Wants UN Drone Investigation
Tbilisi has gone on the diplomatic offensive against Sukhumi and Moscow as it demands that the UN investigate the unpiloted reconnaissance planes shot down over Abkhazia. Georgia continues to insist that the planes did not belong to it. Georgia wants UN special representative in Abkhazia Jean Arnault to determine on what basis the “Abkhazian separatists” are using antiaircraft defenses in the conflict zone and to make his findings publicly known. The Georgian Foreign Ministry simultaneously announced that it is withdrawing from the 1995 CIS agreement on cooperation in air defense. Moscow has responded that Georgia's actions do not affect its interests. Abkhazian President Sergey Bagapsh has ordered everything flying over from the Georgian direction to be shot down from now on.
The Abkhazian Defense Ministry yesterday showed journalists a fragment of one of the two drones downed on Sunday by local air defense forces. “At this time, the pieces found are being identified. We assume that the downed unpiloted flying device is of the same class as the one shot down earlier in the sky over Abkhazia,” said Deputy Defense Minister of Abkhazia Zakan Nanba. He added that the second device fell in an inaccessible spot and has yet to be recovered due to weather conditions.
According to a statement released by the Georgian Defense Ministry, no planes of any kind were shot down by Abkhazian or Russian defenses. “The information being distributed by the Russian Foreign Ministry and the Abkhazian authorities is one more well-planned provocation aimed at escalating the situation,” the statement read. Andrey Smaga, minister-counselor at the Russian embassy in Tbilisi was summoned to the Georgian Foreign Ministry and presented a note stating that Georgia was withdrawing from the 1995 air defense cooperation agreement. A high-placed source in the Russian Foreign Ministry told Kommersant that Georgia's participation in that agreement had long been “a formality.”
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of May 06, 2008
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