EU Steps Up Engagement in Georgia
September 15, 2008
The European Union stepped up its engagement in Georgia on Monday, launching an observer mission to oversee the withdrawal of Russian troops, appointing a special envoy to coordinate diplomatic efforts and preparing a major increase in economic aid.
EU foreign ministers formally approved the deployment of a 200-strong civilian observer mission to Georgia, meant to verify the pullback of Russian troops to positions in the breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia held before the outbreak of fighting on August 7.
They appointed Pierre Morel, a French diplomat with long experience in the region, as a special envoy to oversee the EU’s diplomatic drive and coordinate the bloc’s position ahead of peace talks due to start next month in Geneva.
Ministers gave broad approval to a proposed three-year EU aid package of €500 million ($700 million) to help Georgia recover from the conflict and agreed the EU should host an international donors’ conference to raise still more money for the battered Caucasus nation.
“The European Union must undertake a very significant financial effort,” said EU External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner. “We have to go beyond the ongoing assistance.”
She said the “stability and growth package” designed to run from 2008-2010 will assist people displaced by the conflict, help to rebuild, support Georgia’s economic stability and finance the construction of new infrastructure. Ferrero-Waldner told reporters she hoped the money from the EU’s central budget would be matched by contributions from individual EU nations, bringing the bloc’s total aid to at least €1 billion ($1.4 billion).
The EU said a donors’ conference will be held in Brussels, probably in mid-October.
Ferrero-Waldner said the European Commission hoped to spend €100 million on Georgia by the end of this year, compared to the pre-conflict average of €30 million a year.
The EU observer mission is expected to last at least one year, and cost €31 million. France was to provide the biggest contingent of the unarmed observers — around 70.
Russia says the mission should be limited to parts of Georgia outside South Ossetia and Abkhazia. However Javier Solana, the EU’s foreign policy chief, said the mission should eventually be deployed throughout the country including the separatist run provinces.
Morel, 64, is currently the EU’s special envoy to Central Asia. He served as French ambassador to Russia and Georgia in the 1990s.
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It was not clear how much of the EU aid money would be spent in South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
The EU faces a dilemma in dealing with those regions. Excluding them from the package would reinforce their separation from the rest of Georgia. However, Russia insists that any aid be coordinated with the separatist regimes, which are not recognized by EU nations.
Source: CNN, September 2008
edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/europe/09/15/georgia.eu.aid.ap/index.html
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