Putin: Georgia risking bloodshed
Oct 21, 2006
Russian President Vladimir Putin issued his bluntest warning to Georgia so far on Friday, telling European Union leaders that Tbilisi was risking bloodshed by seeking to regain control over breakaway regions.
Putin sounded a conciliatory note on energy co-operation with the 25-nation EU, agreeing to negotiate on common principles in a new strategic partnership agreement and giving an assurance that foreign oil and gas investments would be respected.
But he firmly rebuffed EU criticism of Russia's blockade of its former Soviet neighbour, saying Georgia had provoked the escalation in tension by staging a military build-up around the Russian-backed regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.
"It is moving in the direction of bloodshed because the Georgian leadership is seeking to restore its control through military means and they are quite open about that," Putin told a joint news conference after dinner with EU leaders.
Georgia's foreign minister accused Putin of deliberately misrepresenting the tensions between Georgia and Russia, and insulting the intelligence of his European colleagues.
"The government of Georgia and the people of Georgia have no intention to use force against its citizens as repeatedly stated," Foreign Minister Gela Bezhuashvili told reporters in Tbilisi.
"This is pure fiction and the Russian president knows this but chooses to presume that the international community is ignorant," he said.
The Europeans delivered a united message that Russia must give European firms a fair chance to exploit its huge energy resources or risk an investor exodus. "We need to develop mutual trust that requires transparency, the rule of law, reciprocity, non-discrimination, market opening and market access," European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said.
Putin said he believed there were no issues in energy co-operation that could not be resolved.
He assured the Europeans that a decision to exclude foreign capital from development of the giant Arctic Shtokman gas field did not signal a change in rules for foreign investors and said Moscow would respect Shell's licence to operate its Sakhalin-2 project, which has been hit by Russian environmental charges.
Tackle criticism
Russian and European officials said Putin sought to tackle EU criticism head-on by inviting the leaders from the outset to question him on any sensitive issue.
Finnish Prime Minister Matti Vanhanen said he had raised the murder of investigative journalist Anna Politkovskaya, a fierce critic of Putin, as well as Moscow's treatment of Georgia and the harassment of Georgians in Russia.
Russia cut transport and postal links with Georgia after Tbilisi briefly detained four Russian army officers on spying charges last month.
Some Georgians have been deported from Russia, Georgian businesses have been shut down and police have asked some schools to provide lists of pupils with Georgian-sounding names.
Moscow has been irked by Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili's pursuit of NATO and EU membership, while Georgia accuses Russia of backing separatists by giving aid and Russian passports to residents of the breakaway territories.
The EU has expressed dismay at Russian moves to impose punitive sanctions on firms such as Royal Dutch Shell and Total that signed contracts in the 1990s.
Vanhanen voiced satisfaction that EU leaders had presented a united front to Putin. EU officials said both central European leaders who favoured a tougher line and France, which stressed common ground with Moscow, stuck to the joint line.
"The EU spoke in one voice, in one single voice. Of course Russia wasn't speaking in the same voice," said Estonian Prime Minister Andrus Ansip.
British Prime Minister Tony Blair said energy ties between Russia and the EU, which imports a quarter of its gas from Russia, had to be based on "clear rules and clear principles".
"Foreign investment is not going to go into Russia if there are question marks about whether that investment is going to be treated in a fair and equitable way," Blair's spokesman said.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, whose country is the biggest customer for Russian gas, said: "We offer security in contracts and we expect the same from Russia, namely also legal security in contracts and access to the Russian market."