As readers may recall, a month or so back I named Georgia’s Mikheil Saakashvili as the craziest world leader [1] of them all. Well because you certainly won’t have heard this if you watch the evening news, and probably not even if you read the newspapers, I just thought I’d deliver an update on the continuing deterioration of his already fragile mental state.
In early August Georgian ships intercepted a Panama-flagged vessel sailing on the Black Sea. The crime? It was en route to the breakaway republic of Abkhazia. Its Turkish captain was sentenced to 24 years in prison [2] for smuggling, although his sentence was subsequently commuted. According to the Russian news agency RIA Novosti, Abkhazia then threatened “to open fire on Georgian ships if they continue their acts of piracy.” [3] To which Georgia’s foreign minister replied that his country would continue to seize ships that violate the borders of what it still considers Georgian territory.
Now from a legal point of view, Georgia is correct of course. Only Russia, Nicaragua and Venezuela have recognised the ‘independence’ of Abkhazia. Officially, the rest of the world still considers the republic to be part of Georgia. In the real world however, Abhazia is a protectorate of Russia. Thus it came as no surprise to find the AP reporting last week that the chief of Russia’s coastguard, Lt. General Viktor Trufanov had declared [4] that from now on Russian forces will intercept any Georgian ships that attempt to stop ships in Abkhazian waters:
“We will do everything to ensure the security of the Russian state, the security of the Abkhazian state. We have a task and we will carry it out…”
To which a Georgian official replied:
“From the perspective of international maritime law, the (Russian) coast guards are pirates and this is plain and simple occupation…“
Today the first Russian patrol ship took to the seas [5] to resume the work of humiliating Saakashvili. Meanwhile Russia has also announced that it will build new military bases in both Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
And so the temperature continues to rise. Will Saakashvili do the sane thing and back down? Or does he seriously think that the Georgian navy can accomplish what the Georgian army singularly failed to do just over a year ago? Saakashvili still has influential friends in America [6], but Obama made it abundantly clear last week [7] that his goal is to ‘engage’ with Russia. However even if Obama’s rhetoric was as hostile as Bush’s used to be, well, there’s still no way Georgia would ever receive meaningful support in a battle with Russia. Ever. Saakashvili would thus have to be crazy to continue provoking his neighbor, unless he wants to be a martyr — which to gauge by his struggles to remain in power is plainly not one of his desires.
But then again, as we have already established, he is absolutely crazy. And who can predict the actions of the genuinely demented?
Meanwhile for those who are interested in knowing a little more about Georgia’s internal situation, Voice of America reported last week that there is ‘virtually no media freedom’ [8] in the country and that all political opposition is stifled. Hm… sounds a lot like Putin’s Russia, the oppressive state against which Georgia is often held up as a model of progress. The madman is sitting on a powder keg, waving a match around. Will he be the third Georgian leader since independence to be ousted from office by a revolution/coup?
Hat tip: The Exiled [9]
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Daniel Kalder [12]
Latest posts by Daniel Kalder (Posts [13])
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