Khatazhukov: world community must recognize independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia

The war in South Ossetia has shown that Russia lacks forces to ensure safety of the peaceful population, therefore, the world community must recognize the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, asserts Valery Khatazhukov, chairman of the Human Rights Centre of Kabardino-Balkaria.

"The events in South Ossetia have shown that Russia, while possessing sufficient potentials for solving the issues delegated by the peacekeeping mandate on non-admission of conflict restart and peace preservation, is not always capable to timely prevent confrontation of the conflicting parties and to ensure safety of the peaceful population in the non-recognized republics. And, consequently, any further delay of the world community in official recognition of independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia can promote conflict restart and destruction of peaceful population," runs the statement of the human rights activist.

According to Mr Khatazhukov, after recognition of Kosovo, Russia has repeatedly warned the West about a possibility to recognize also the independence of self-proclaimed republics in the territory of former Soviet Union. And it was for this reason, the human rights activist believes, that Russia decided to lift various political and economic sanctions in relation to Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which "was the main reason for defrosting the decaying regional conflict."

"It seemed that the logical end of this process could be Russia's recognition of independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. However, this was not done and was one of the reasons of the tragedy that took place in South Ossetia," said Valery Khatazhukov.

Speaking about the need to recognize independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Mr Khatazhukov hopes that in this case new mechanisms will evolve, which will not admit any new application of violence against peaceful population.

"In particular, international guarantees of safety can appear. These were the arguments used by supporters of recognition of Kosovo's independence," writes the head of the Human Rights Centre of Kabardino-Balkaria.