EurasianStudies_0110..

January-March 2010 JOURNAL OF EURASIAN STUDIES Volume II., Issue 1.
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Union was an ethnic melting pot, with many ethnic minorities scattering throughout the vast territory.
Under the leviathan control, the borders of all the Soviet republics were arbitrarily drawn for the sake of
administrative convenience. Hence, it was but natural, when the ‘parade of sovereignty’ took over after
the collapse of the Soviet Union, all the different regions with different identities aspired to be
independent. Hence, on the anvil of the Soviet disintegration numerous regions such as Nagorno-
Karabakh, South Ossetia, Abkhazia and Chechnya declared independence.
In 1990 under the wave of perestroika and glasnost South Ossetia declared itself a Soviet Democratic
Republic which was rejected by Georgia. Violent conflict broke out between the breakaway region and
Georgia towards the end of 1991 leading to death of about 1,000 people and displacement of about
100,000 people both from South Ossetia and Georgia, mostly across the border into North Ossetia. In
1992, a peacekeeping force comprising Ossetians, Russians and Georgians was established. In November
1992, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe set up a Mission in Georgia to monitor
the peacekeeping operation. Then Georgian leader, Eduard Shevardnadze, also the former Soviet
Foreign Minister, adopted a reconciliatory approach and promised autonomy to breakaway republics of
Abkhazia and South Ossetia within Georgian federation. After the Rose revolution of 2003 which thrust
the 36 year old Western educated, Mikheil Saakashvili to power, Georgia took a tough approach towards
the breakaway republics. Saakashvili promised to integrate the breakaway republics with Georgia.
Under his leadership a new Ministry of Reintegration was set up with the task of integrating breakaway
regions. Violent clashes between Georgia and South Ossetia occurred in 2004 and 2007 but without any
positive outcome.
After Saakashvili came to power in 2003, the conflict in South Ossetia got further embroiled in power
politics with Saakashvili insisting on withdrawal of Russian forces from South Ossetia, and ouster of
Russia from any dialogue process for the resolution of the conflict. Saakashvili made the following
demands for a peaceful resolution of the conflict. In 2006 and 2007, there were violent clashes between
Russian supported South Ossetian and Georgian forces in Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia. In
April 2007 Georgia retained control over parts of the region’s eastern and southern districts where it
created a Provisional Administrative Entity of South Ossetia under the leadership of Dmitry Sanakoev.
Saakashvili appealed to the UN for its intervention in the conflict as the existing format for conflict
resolution, dominated by Russia, is not workable as Russia supports the breakaway republic under the
leadership Eduard Kokoity. Georgia has insisted for dialogue directly with Tskhinvali without any
outside interference. Saakashvili has insisted that South Ossetia is an internal affair of Georgia; hence
there is no need for Russian interference in the conflict.
In case of South Ossetia, three factors make it prominent the context of power politics in Central
Eurasia. First, its location between Georgia and Russia has made it a crucible of power politics between
the Western oriented Georgia, and the lost super power but rising Russia. Second, South Ossetia in
Georgia and North Ossetia in Russia ethnically belong to the same stock. It provides Russia the leeway
to interfere in South Ossetia to enforce peace in the region and to protect people holding Russian
passports. Third, the location of South Ossetia at a distance of 55km from the oil pipeline that passes
from Baku via Tbilisi to Ceyhan in Turkey, make it strategically important as it is one of pipelines that
does not pass through Russian territory. Hence, an independent or Russian integrated South Ossetia
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