Commentary of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of South Ossetia

On state border line denotation

Georgian diplomacy is making titanic efforts to find direct or indirect support for their claims on territories of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Western sponsors of Georgia express solidarity with Tbilisi one in a while to support their protégé. Georgia is especially concerned with works carried out by South Ossetia on denotation of the state border line. However, Georgia was able to rush its interpretation of the situation at some of the European venues to expressed ‘concerns’ about ‘installation of barbed-wire’, ‘restriction of freedom of movement’ that was presented in Tbilisi as success Georgian diplomacy.

Meanwhile the reality is that there are no diplomatic relations between South Ossetia and Georgia, therefore, there are no agreements that regulate border crossing. South Ossetia is a sovereign state, the border regime, its denotation and arrangement is regulated by legislation of Republic of South Ossetia.

In the frame of the Agreement between Republic of South Ossetia and Russian Federation on joint efforts for protection of the state border, protection of state border is jointly done by South Ossetian and Russian border guards.

All the attempts of Georgia to dictate South Ossetia its position are hopeless. It would have been much better for future of Georgia to follow the example of Russia and negotiate with Republic of South Ossetia delimitation and demarcation of the border line instead of looking for support in Strasburg and Vienna.

It should be noted that attempts to interfere into internal affairs of South Ossetia, a sovereign state, are hopeless. At the same time we confirm our committal to norm and fundamental principals of the International Law and count on their observance by all parties of the International Community.

Tskhinval, 7 May 2014

07.05.2014