Thursday 4 September 2008

EU report about Georgia

«It seems however – but they will understand this themselves the coming days – that houses in Gori have not been damaged heavily, whereas the villages around the city have been completely smashed down. Therefore, the refugees from Gori might be able to go back to their houses soon, whereas those from the neighbouring villages do not have a house anymore.»

«Eka Gvalia is also noticing a sort of tendency by Georgian Government to push refugees to return home, more for strategic – it seems – rather than for humanitarian reasons. Eka’s feeling is that the government is not doing everything in their power to ease the situation, in a way maybe that the humanitarian dimension of the matter is used as propaganda for the conflict

Highlighted by me.

http://www.pmmg.org.ge/uploads/publish/EUreport_final.pdf

Human Rights Tribune writes a chronology of the war and looking for facts

Human Rights Tribune ( http://humanrights-geneva.info/How-the-Georgian-war-began,3393 )

«How the Georgian war began»

«On August 14, Georgian prime minister Lado Gurgenidze gave more details from his side saying, “At around 6 am the Georgian forces blew up the Kurta bridge (about three km north of Tskhinvali). A column of the Russian troops that had entered the previous night from the Roki tunnel was there, so a couple of their vehicles were blown up as well… Think about how many hours of preparation, assembly, then marching, it would take for that column, moving at that speed on rugged terrain to be at the Kurta bridge at six in the morning. If that isn’t a premeditated invasion, I don’t know what is.”

Many of these assertions are disputed. For example, an IWPR reporter who visited the area last week did not see any destroyed bridges in the Kurta area

Monday 1 September 2008

AP: Georgia admits to dropping cluster bombs

A prominent human rights group says Georgia has admitted dropping cluster bombs in its military offensive to assert control over the restive province of South Ossetia.

Human Rights Watch says it has received an official letter from Georgia's Defense Ministry that acknowledges use of the M85 cluster munition near the Roki tunnel that connects South Ossetia with Russia.

The M85 is the same weapon that was used extensively by Israel in its 2006 war with Hezbollah in Lebanon.

HRW arms division researcher Bonnie Docherty told reporters in Geneva on Monday that Russia undoubtedly used cluster munition in several places during the conflict. However, Russia has denied using the weapon.


http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5je4oTliESokD-zge0diVbbczCPIgD92TT2VG0