GEORGIA UPDATE: OCTOBER 16

S E C R E T SECTION 01 OF 02 MOSCOW 011582

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/16/2016
TAGS: PREL MARR ETRD PREF GG RS
SUBJECT: GEORGIA UPDATE: OCTOBER 16

REF: A) ST PETERSBURG 631 B) MOSCOW 11539 AND PREVIOUS

Classified By: AMBASSADOR WILLIAM J. BURNS. Reason 1.4 (b, d)

Summary
--------------


1. (C) Deportations of undocumented Georgian nationals
continue. Round-ups have slowed in Moscow, but picked up in
St. Petersburg. Russian and Georgian officials continue to
trade insults and veiled threats. Harassment of ethnic
Georgians may have peaked thanks to a backlash from Russians
of many political persuasions. End Summary.

Deportations
--------------


2. (C) Georgian Ambassador Chubinishvili confirmed (see Ref.
A) October 16 that "about 100" undocumented Georgians are
detained in St. Petersburg. The Georgian Embassy has sent a
consular officer to help facilitate their departure.
Georgians are soliciting funds from relatives of the
detainees to pay for the flights. Detentions in Moscow are
down, Chubinishvili told us, because undocumented Georgians
are "in hiding."


3. (U) Interfax reported that, according to the Georgian
Embassy in Moscow, about 200 Georgians will be deported from
Moscow to Tbilisi on October 17.

Statements
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4. (U) Russian politicians and officials continue to make
statements harshly critical of Georgian President
Saakashvili. Federation Council Member Vasiliy Likhachev
told the press October 14 that the Saakashvili's statements
Georgia should put "his partners in Brussels and the U.S." on
guard against the "militarization" of Georgia. CHOD Yuriy
Baluyevskiy, commenting on a statement by Georgian DefMin
Okruashvili that Georgia does not fear war with Russia, said
October 16 that Russia has no intention of starting a war
with Georgia, but that Georgia will bear responsibility for
any military confrontations in Abkhazia or South Ossetia.

Ethnic Harassment
--------------


5. (C) The harassment of ethnic Russians in Georgia -- many
of them Russian citizens -- has produced a backlash among
some Russians. In Kazan, one Tatar intellectual told us that
the "demonization" of Georgians as a people bespeaks a new
growth of "Russia for the Russians" ethnocentrism. Russian
nationalist commentator Sergey Markedonov posted an article
October 13 decrying the harassment campaign, saying the
Kremlin was stooping to racist policies. He compared the
campaign to the persecution of Volga Germans in 1914-15, and
called it a public relations gift to western media eager to
defeat Russia in the information war. Markedonov, like other
Russians we have talked with, found the tax harassment of
popular Russian writer Boris Akunin (the pen-name of Grigol
Chkhartishvili) most offensive. Markedonov dryly pointed out
that most Russian teenagers these days get their sense of
Russian patriotism from reading Akunin's books. Markedonov
also castigated the Kremlin for its irrational, "emotional"
and "hysterical" approach to Georgia. Instead of having
clear goals in mind when imposing sanctions (such as forcing
Georgia to sign a statement on the non-use of force against
Abkhazia or South Ossetia),Markedonov charged that Russian
policymakers are bogged down in "fear of NATO or Soros."


6. (C) The backlash may have further tempered the campaign
against ethnic Georgians (which had already caused outrage
when a school principal publicly vowed never to comply with
the order to give the police school record information on the
parents of students with Georgian surnames). At least one
major Georgian restaurant in Moscow has reopened after
closing down "voluntarily" for a week. We were told of a
similar incident in Kazan: inspectors visited the owner of
the most popular Georgian restaurant and told him
apologetically that they were under orders to find a reason
to shut him down. They advised him to shut down voluntarily
and wait until it all blew over.


7. (C) Sounding a discordant note, Kremlin-connected
political analyst Sergey Markov told us that the campaign
would continue and that clear instructions had been issued by
the authorities to throw the book at Georgian criminal
operations and major businesses for violations of laws that
will continue to go unenforced against other ethnic groups.
Having just returned from a trip to Abkhazia, Markov stressed
that Russia's problem was with Saakashvili, not with
Georgians, and discounted the possibility of improved

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relations absent a change in Tbilisi of leadership or
orientation towards Russia.
BURNS