Following explosions in downtown Sukhumi, Abkhazia closed June 30 the borders with Georgia.
Photo: Vladimir Popov
| Other Photos |
 |
|
 |
Sukhumi Explosion Closed Border
Following explosions in downtown Sukhumi, Abkhazia closed Monday the borders with Georgia. This action of Abkhazia’s leadership is bound to cloud peaceful negotiations that started in Berlin yesterday.
President of unrecognized and breakaway Georgia’s province Abkhazia Sergei Bagapsh announced Monday that the borders with Georgia were closed. The reason was the bomb explosions in Sukhumi, explained Ruslan Kishmaria, who is Abkhazia’s spokesman in bordering Gala region.
The bombs exploded at around 12:00 near the market in central Sukhumi yesterday, injuring eight, including a Russian. A criminal case was promptly initiated on count of terrorism. The primary lead is the actions of secret services of Georgia aimed at potential destabilization and the break of the holiday season in Abkhazia, said a source with Abkhazia’s prosecutors.
Abkhazia’s Interior Minister Sergei Shamba is of similar opinion. “If any other leads could have been considered in the wake of the Gagra explosions, the new explosions have left no doubts where all these clues are leading. Their political motivation is evident already. Georgia’s secret services are endeavoring to break holiday season each year,” Shamba specified, adding the terrorists are arriving in Abkhazia as if they were relatives of the locals. “There are lots of means, our country isn’t the closed one,” the minister pointed out.
Meanwhile, the explosions in Abkhazia coupled with the border shutdown may materially aggravate the negotiations that started in Berlin yesterday. According to the sources, the plans were that Moscow and Tbilisi would elaborate an agreement on normalizing the situation there and Moscow President Dmitry Medvedev and Georgia’s President Mikhail Saakashvili would sign it in the next effort.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of July 01, 2008
|
|
|
