WHO OWES WHOM AND WHO NEEDS WHO

Back in January 2011, when Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili visited neighbouring Armenia, a number of the Georgian papers reminded their readers, citing the results of opinion polls, that Armenians included Georgia in the list of unfriendly nations, alongside Turkey and Azerbaijan.  "It is obvious that such sentiments are not just the result of rapprochement between Tbilisi and Baku.  After all, Georgia's national security doctrine clearly states that Azerbaijan is a strategic ally, while Armenia is just a pragmatic partner", the Georgian Times wrote earlier this year.

And this is not the only, or even main, reason for the negative attitude towards Georgia in Armenia.  Events show that the main reason for this attitude is Armenia's claims on Georgia's Samtskhe-Javakheti region.

"The struggle for the rights of ethnic Armenians in Javakhk has acquired a new dimension", members of the coordinating council for the defence of the rights of ethnic Armenians in Javakhk, chairman of the Javakhk Union and Member of Parliament from the ruling Republican Party of Armenia, Shirak Torosyan, and chairman of the Yerkir (Country) Union Sevak Artsuni announced on 10 March.

They said that the organizations which form the coordinating council will join the online petition by Armenian bloggers to UN General Secretary Ban Ki-moon, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso and Council of Europe General Secretary Thorbjorn Jagland.

The petition demands that the Georgian authorities "stop their discriminatory policy towards the ethnic Armenians of Javakhk, stop persecutions of ethnic Armenian activists and release Vaagn Chakhalyan (head of the Armenian separatist organization United Javakhk - R+), grant Armenian the status of a regional language in Javakhk, give legal status to the Armenian Apostolic Church and hand back the churches which were confiscated in the Soviet period."

As can be seen from the list of demands, an attempt is being made by members of the ruling party in Armenia at gross interference in the domestic policy of the neighbouring state. So what forces are behind these claims and what might be the outcome of all this? Deputy Speaker of the Georgian Parliament and member of the opposition Christian Democratic Party, Levan Vepkhvadze, discusses these and other issues with R+.

- Members of the so-called coordinating council for the defence of the rights of ethnic Armenians in Javakhk, which is headed by members of the Armenian Parliament, promised to raise the 'Javakhk issue' in the European Parliament, OSCE and other international organizations.  Is it possible that there will be a rise of separatism in the region of Javakheti as was seen in the 1990s?

-Socially, the region of Samtskhe-Javakheti is no different from other regions of Georgia.  Of course, there are social issues there which need to be addressed, but these have nothing to do with ethnic minorities.  There is a problem with the local agriculture sector there.  The farmers in the region sometimes cannot sell their potato crops at the price they want.  In Javakheti, potatoes are the main crop.  But this is a problem which is common to every region of Georgia.  For example, farmers in Kakheti have problems selling their grapes.  In other words, this is a typical problem for Georgian farmers - when to sell their crops and at what price.  There is no ethnic problem here.

-The strategic Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway will cross the Javakheti region.  In Armenia, they make no secret of their negative attitude toward this project.  Could the railway become a target for terrorist acts by the ethnic Armenian separatist organizations Virk, Javakhk and Parvana, which operate in Javakheti?

-There are no problems with Armenian-Georgian relations in that region.  Unfortunately, there are people or groups which strive to build political careers for themselves by exploiting these issues.  We can confront them by stepping up the activities of the central authorities.  Javakheti has an additional problem:  the ethnic Armenian population in the region does not speak Georgia's official language, which makes it difficult to integrate them into the state system.  Without speaking the language, they cannot work in the civil service, study in universities and so on.

This is why the government's efforts focus on integrating the Javakheti region into Georgia's political system.

As for the possibility of sabotage of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway, I do not think that anyone would dare to hinder its implementation.  Everyone realizes that a terrorist act on the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars would result in a backlash which might affect transportation of cargoes moving in other directions across Georgian territory, in particular, the transportation of cargoes from Georgia's seaports on the Black Sea to Armenia.  This is all interconnected.  Yerevan needs good relations between Armenia and Georgia more than Tbilisi needs them, because Georgia is a transit area of vital importance to Yerevan.

-Incidentally, the separatists have effectively conducted ethnic cleansing of the local ethnic Russian population from that region.  The ethnic Russian community of Old Believers was forced to abandon their villages under pressure from local ethnic Armenians...

-These problems have nothing to do with attitudes towards ethnic Russians or ethnic Georgians.  The point is that in all regions there are problems of land ownership.  While in other regions of Georgia, people argue over square metres of land, in Javakheti they argue over hectares of land.  And these arguments take place not only between villages populated by ethnic Armenians and ethnic Russians, but also between the ethnic Armenian-populated villages, too.  Because of the difficult weather conditions in Javakheti, even Ajarians who were resettled to Javakheti after their villages were destroyed by landslides could not establish themselves there.  Many of them went back to Ajaria.

-What is the situation with the integration of the ethnic Azerbaijani population into Georgian society?

-The main problem for the Azerbaijani population is their lack of knowledge of the Georgian language.  There are also social and economic problems which are common to all regions of Georgia.  Speaking Georgian would enable Azerbaijanis to take part in contests for vacancies in the civil service, receive university education and so on.  The level of awareness in the population of the political and economic processes under way in the country is also very important.

The Georgian Education Ministry runs a programme to teach Georgia's official language to ethnic Azerbaijanis and Armenians.  But the funding available to the programme is simply trifling - 600,000 lari (about $400,000).  For example, the Georgian Government allocated $6 million to finance 1,000 invited English-speaking teachers.  Of course, it is important for Georgians to speak English.  But teaching the official language of the country to ethnic minorities to enable them to benefit from state programmes to which they are entitled is no less important.

Speaking Georgian cannot hinder the development of the national culture of Azerbaijanis or Armenians.  But it would help them with paperwork and enable them to embark on successful careers.

-The Georgian Foreign Ministry announced that in 2011, Tbilisi might come up with an initiative on regulation of the Azerbaijan-Armenia conflict.  How successful might an initiative from Georgia be?

-Georgia can play an important role in achieving peace between its neighbouring states.  But coming up with initiatives might cause problems with those neighbours.  An initiative must envisage mutually acceptable concessions by the parties to the conflict.  If the concessions are unacceptable to those parties, problems might emerge in relations with the party which came up with the initiative.