Untitled

IRAKLI GIVIASHVILI
INTERNATIONAL LEGAL ASSESSMENT OF THE RECENT STEPTS TAKEN
BY THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION WITH RESPECT TO GEORGIA
1. INTERNATIONAL LEGAL OBLIGATION
OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
NOTWITHSTANDING DECLINING
THE OBLIGATIONS DERIVING FROM
THE 1996 DECISION BY IT ON 6 MARCH, 2008
According to the paragraph 6 of the Decision
Taken by the Council of the Heads of
States of the Commonwealth of Independent
States (CIS) on Measures for Settlement of
the Conflict in Abkhazia, Georgia the States
parties to the Decision (including the Russian
Federation) confirm, that Abkhazia is an integral
part of Georgia and without consent of
the Government of Georgia they will not exercise
trade, economic, financial, transport or
other relations with the authorities of the Abkhaz
side (para. 6(a)), as well as neither will
they engage themselves in official contacts
with the representatives or officials of the
structures established in the territory of Abkhazia,
nor with the members of military formations
of Abkhazia (para. 6(b)). As for the paragraph
7 of the aforementioned Decision, the
Member-States of the CIS will not permit the
functioning of representations of the authorities
of neither the Abkhaz side in their territories,
nor the persons in a capacity of official
representative of those authorities. 1
On 6 March, 2008 the Russian Federation
declared about declining the obligations
ensuing the Decision taken on 19 March, 1996
by the Council of the Heads of the CIS on Measures
for Settlement of the Conflict in Abkhazia,
Georgia.
The 1996 Decision of the Council of the
Heads of States of the CIS on Measures for
Settlement of the Conflict in Abkhazia, Georgia
is a decision made by a statutory body of
the CIS. Unlike the agreements concluded
under the aegis of the CIS (which belong to
international treaties and in relation to which
the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties
2 applies), there is no legal document clearly
defining the legal status of the decisions of
the CIS statutory bodies, and in particular clarifying
whether the decisions made by the CIS
organs represent international treaties.
The question, whether a decision of the
CIS statutory body is an internaitonal treaty,
is very vague. The CIS Expert Group (a Consultative
Committee), which makes legal analysis
of the decisions taken by the CIS statutory
bodies based on the review of the CIS member-States
practices, was charged to elucidate
the issue. According to the document 3 drafted
by the group the legal status of the decisions
made by the statutory bodies of the CIS are
diversely perceived in different memberstates.
The aforementioned analytical document
clearly provides for the formal position
of the Russian Federation with regard to the
legal status of the decisions of the CIS. In particular,
the Russian Federation does not regard
the CIS decisions to be international treaties.
They are considered as acts adopted by
an international organization, which entail certain
(political) obligations for its States-Parties.
Neither Belarus nor Kazakhstan recognize the
international legal character of the decisions.
However, it must be mentioned that there is a
group of states which consider the CIS decisions
to be international treaties and extend
over them the Vienna Convention on the Law
of Treaties. Georgia belongs to this group of
states and therefore it carries out the domestic
procedures with respect to the decisions.
As regards Armenia, only the decisions taken
within the CIS that are ratified by the Parliament
of Armenia are considered to be international
treaties.
The foregone implies that Georgia is not
in a position to demand from the Russian Federation
to agree the issue over the withdrawal
215