Medvedev Risks Losing Leverage by Backing Breakaways

By Celestine Bohlen

Aug. 26 (Bloomberg) -- When President Dmitry Medvedev said on Aug. 14 that Russia will support diplomatic-status decisions by Georgia's breakaway republics, he stopped short of promising to recognize South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent.

Now that Russia's parliament has unanimously called on him to back their nationalist aspirations, he may need that wiggle room.

President George W. Bush said yesterday he was ``deeply concerned'' by the appeal to Medvedev from Russian lawmakers and urged the Russian leadership to ``meet its commitments and not recognize these separatist regions.''

If Medvedev supports their independence, he'll likely further strain ties with Western leaders angry over the five-day war his country waged to protect South Ossetia, encourage separatists within Russia's own borders and undermine its case against Kosovo's independence from Serbia. Changing their current status as autonomous pro-Moscow regions also would cost Medvedev diplomatic leverage he may need later.

``If he does this, it would be to further aggravate the relationship between Russia and the West,'' said Masha Lipman, a political analyst at the Moscow Carnegie Center. ``Moving toward further isolation of Russia would be catastrophic.''

Germany, Poland and Lithuania joined the criticism of the Russian vote yesterday and urged Medvedev, who has the final say, to reject the idea.

Separatists in Moscow

Both regions have repeatedly asked Russia to recognize them. Abkhazian leader Sergei Bagapsh and his South Ossetian counterpart, Eduard Kokoity, were in Moscow yesterday to push for recognition.

Boris Gryzlov, speaker of Russia's State Duma, parliament's lower house, said he expects Medvedev to respond to the lawmakers' vote ``in a very short time,'' the Interfax news service reported. U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney plans to visit Georgia next week.

Bush said Russia's commitment to a cease-fire accord includes carrying out talks on the ``security and stability'' issues in the separatist regions, according to a statement released from his Crawford, Texas, ranch.

Leaving the regions as is would allow Russia ``to use the threat of recognition as a bargaining chip and to use the unresolved status of Abkhazia and South Ossetia as a way of projecting its influence,'' said Charles Kupchan, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations in Washington. ``Russia has benefited from this ambiguity in the past.''

Direct Ties

South Ossetia and Abkhazia broke away from Georgia in wars in the early 1990s. Russia has had peacekeepers in the regions for years. After Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili cultivated an alliance with the West, Russia this year forged direct diplomatic and economic ties with the regions.

A Georgian military operation on Aug. 7 to retake South Ossetia prompted Russia's incursion into the country, home to an oil pipeline from the Caspian Sea that the West sees as strategically important because it bypasses Russian territory. Russian soldiers now are stationed in security zones extending beyond the enclaves after a cease-fire accord brokered by French President Nicolas Sarkozy.

WTO, NATO

Russia's relations with the West continued to deteriorate yesterday. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin called for withdrawal of some agreements made as part of Russia's bid to join the World Trade Organization. Russia's North Atlantic Treaty Organization envoy, Dmitry Rogozin, said leaders in Moscow are considering altering ``the volume, quality and timetable'' of cooperation with the military alliance, which restricted contacts with Russia on Aug. 19.

The relationship has ``sharply deteriorated, and we are not to blame,'' Medvedev said.

Medvedev didn't address recognition of South Ossetia and Abkhazia in an appearance yesterday with Moldovan President Vladimir Voronin in Sochi, about 100 kilometers (62 miles) along the Black Sea coast from the Abkhaz capital, Sukhumi. Medvedev said that the conflict in Georgia ``should be a warning to all'' and that Russia will broker talks to resolve similar tensions between Moldova and the separatist region of Transnistria.

Nina Khrushcheva, senior fellow at the World Policy Institute and great-granddaughter of former Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev, said Russia probably has no grand plan for the Georgian regions.

`Opportunistic War'

``This was an opportunistic war and therefore I don't think they have a strategic agenda,'' she said. ``They may have won something, but they don't have a plan. Putin kept warning the West, about Kosovo, about missile defense, and then when he had a chance, he reacted the way Russians do. But that doesn't mean he has a plan.''

With Russian forces in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, the outcome of the Georgia conflict is unlikely to satisfy Saakashvili.

``Russia isn't a mediator any longer in Georgia's separatist regions, a role it played de facto before,'' Saakashvili said in televised comments yesterday in the central city of Gori. ``Now the Russian government is trying to legalize its actions and to drag us back into the Soviet Union.''

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she expected Medvedev ``will not sign off'' on independence because doing so would violate the Aug. 16 cease-fire.

Poland, EU

Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk called on the European Union, which is holding an emergency Sept. 1 summit on the conflict, to have a ``determined and firm stance toward Russia over Georgia.''

Russia's own restless ethnic minorities likely will play into Medvedev's thinking. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the North Caucasus region, a patchwork of rival nationalities, has been beset by two separatist wars in Chechnya and other clashes involving Muslim and Christian groups.

Another option would be annexing the regions into Russia, which already includes North Ossetia. South Ossetia's Foreign Minister Murat Dzhioyev said yesterday that his region won't seek to join Russia before it achieves international recognition, Interfax reported.

Vadim Mukhanov, senior researcher at the Center for Caucasian Research at the Moscow State Institute for International Relations, ruled out the prospect of Russia annexing either region.

``I don't see the Russian Federation taking on this headache,'' he said.

Kosovo's Independence

Russia this year backed allies in Serbia in opposing Kosovo's declaration of independence, which was recognized by much of the West. That precedent, cited by South Ossetia and Abkhazia in arguing for independence, may cut both ways for Medvedev.

``Any kind of unilateral attempt to change the situation is fraught with problems, which is what Russia has been warning about since Kosovo,'' said James Collins, a former U.S. ambassador to Russia who heads the Russia and Eurasia program at the Washington-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Alexander Rahr, a Russia expert at the German Council on Foreign Relations in Berlin, said Kosovo leaves Medvedev with little choice: ``There's no way out,'' he said, predicting he'll recognize both regions. ``This is a consequence of the recognition of Kosovo by the West and Western policy in the Balkans.''

To contact the reporters on this story: Celestine Bohlen in Paris at cbohlen1@bloomberg.net