Abkhazia no longer considers the present format of the Geneva talks suitable and insists that its status be advanced from “participant” to “delegation” in the Geneva process, according to a report issued by Abkhazia’s foreign ministry on November 19.

The report reiterated the statements made prior to the most recent 21st round of Geneva talks held on October 11. Abkhazia’s foreign minister Vyacheslav Chirikba said on September 17 that “the Geneva process is in crisis” as it fails to provide effective decision-making mechanisms. He said that nothing can be resolved “in this vicious format.”

At the subsequent meeting in Geneva, the Moscow-backed leaderships of Abkhazia and South Ossetia insisted on changes to the format of the Geneva negotiations with an aim to upgrade their status as “participants” to that of “delegations” and to subordinate the humanitarian agenda to “status-driven political discussions.”

The talks are mediated by the EU, the UN, and OSCE, and were launched in Geneva in 2008. Negotiations have been held in two separate informal working groups with the participation of negotiators from Georgia, Russia, and the U.S. with the status of “delegation” and the Sukhumi and Tskhinvali regimes represented in the capacity of “participants.” The first group discusses security-related issues and the second humanitarian issues. Through the new assertion, the Moscow-backed regimes in Sukhumi and Tskhinvali aim to make their status within the Geneva format equal to that of other negotiators.

Moreover, given the continuous resistance on the part of the two breakaway regions to accept the return of IDPs and refugees, subjecting humanitarian and human rights issues to status-driven deliberations would further diminish the significance of such issues, and allow Sukhumi and Tskhinvali to conceal the multiple cases of human rights violations taking place across these territories from international scrutiny.

In this context, during the most recent round of Geneva negotiations, the Georgian side presented data to the working group on violations of both the human rights of residents in the occupied territories and the freedom of movement across the so called administrative line, which is one of the major problems for the people affected by the conflict. The proposal submitted by Tbilisi during the previous round of negotiations, aiming to simplify the access of certain categories of residents to graves, cultural and religious sites on the other side of the ceasefire line, received no reaction from the secessionist regimes, according to the Georgian Foreign Ministry.

Aside from humanitarian issues, the security-related negotiations attained some success during the latest round of negotiations according to the former deputy foreign minister and Georgian chief negotiator in the Geneva Talks, Sergi Kapanadze. “The work on the document [on a non-use of force agreement between Georgia and Russia] has started and this will … close this chapter on non-use of force negotiation,” Kapanadze said after the Geneva meeting.

Nevertheless, the Russian Foreign Ministry restated on October 12 that Moscow would support only bilateral, legally binding agreements between Sukhumi and Tbilisi, as well as between Tskhinvali and Tbilisi.

Meanwhile, the new state minister for reintegration, Paata Zakareishvili, said that Georgia’s newly elected government was ready to recognize Abkhazia and South Ossetia as parties to the conflict though this move must not be considered as a step towards recognition of the independence of the two breakaway regions.

Representatives of the previous government strongly opposed this approach, arguing that it would directly affect the breakaway regions’ status of occupied territories and grant Moscow additional levers for convincing more states to acknowledge their independence.

Zakareishvili also proposed to start a dialogue on the restoration of a railway that links Armenia to the Russian Federation through Abkhazia. The idea is an irritant to Azerbaijan which sees the restoration of the railway as the end of Armenia’s isolation and an enhancement of Yerevan’s position on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

In response to Zakareishvili’s statement, the Executive Secretary of the ruling Yeni Azerbaijan party Musa Qasimli said that if Tbilisi decides to open the railway, then Azerbaijan could cease its economic projects in Georgia and ensure support for the separatist regimes in Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

With reference to Zakareishvili’s statement, the November 19 report from Abkhazia’s

Foreign Ministry stated that “Whatever promises are made … giving us ‘everything except recognition,’ … [or] ‘opening a railway link via Abkhazia,’ ... we are quite well-informed to avoid falling into all kinds of political and diplomatic traps, which some would like to place around Abkhazia.” The language can be considered a message to the new Georgian government that Abkhazia will not consider any initiatives except ones relating to the region’s international status.