June 25-26, 2024 saw the 61st round of the Geneva International Discussions on Security and Stability in Transcaucasia, established in accordance with Medvedev – Sarkozy agreements, dated August 12, 2008 and September 8, 2008. Delegations from the Republic of South Ossetia, the Republic of Abkhazia, Georgia, the Russian Federation, the USA as well as representatives of the EU, the UN, and the OSCE participated in the meeting. The South Ossetian delegation was led by State Counselor to the President K. K. Kochiev.
The participants marked the commitment of all parties to further work in framework of the GID. The security situation at the state border between South Ossetia and Georgia was assessed as relatively stable.
During the discussion, positive assessment was given to the work of the Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism (IPRM) as an important factor for maintaining stability and security at the South Ossetian-Georgian border. The effectiveness of the “hot line” operating in framework of the IPRM was marked as well.
The South Ossetian and the Russian representatives once again called the Georgian party to get to joint work on delimitation and further demarcation of the state border between the Republic of South Ossetia and Georgia, as an important factor for decreasing the threat of incidents at the border and destabilization.
The South Ossetian, the Abkhaz and the Russian participants noted that effective security maintenance demands signing of a legally binding document on non-use of force against South Ossetia and Abkhazia by Georgia.
A thorough discussion continued on humanitarian issues, prioritizing the destiny of missing citizens of South Ossetia. The South Ossetian delegation stated the need to insert more dynamic to the work on clarifying the destiny of the missing persons and called for the Georgian side to undertake practical steps in order to solve this problem.
Serious attention was once again drawn to the ongoing gross violations by Georgia of the rights of the Ossetians, natives of the Kazbeg region (Tyrsygom), who have been barred of access to their ancestral villages by Georgian authorities over the last years.
At the background of the adoption of the next politicized resolution on the problem of refugees at the UN General Assembly, the South Ossetian and the Abkhaz delegations made a joint statement, in which emphasized the destructive character of this Georgian initiative, which deprives of any sense the discussion on the problem of refugees and displaced persons at the Geneva platform.
The parties exchanged opinion on a number of other humanitarian issues.
The next round of the GID is scheduled for the end of 2024.
June 26, 2024