RESTRICTIONS ON FOREIGNERS IN NORTH OSSETIA

S E C R E T SECTION 01 OF 02 MOSCOW 006390

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/16/2016
TAGS: PREL PGOV PREF PBTS MARR MOPS EAID OSCE RS GG
SUBJECT: RESTRICTIONS ON FOREIGNERS IN NORTH OSSETIA

Classified By: Minister-Counselor for Political Affairs Kirk Augustine.
Reason 1.4 (b, d)


1. (C) Summary: On March 21 the Russian Government issued a
decree that puts most of the Republic of North Ossetia
off-limits to foreigners. Local authorities began enforcing
the decree this month, with immediate effects on
international assistance organizations. Most local observers
relate the Federal decree to increased tensions with Georgia.
Local authorities, however, appear most eager to exclude
assistance workers from the Prigorodnyy district, where
tensions have been rising between ethnic Ossetians and Ingush
IDPs. Local authorities also claim the existence of a "zone
of counter-terrorist operations" banning Russian citizens as
well as foreigners. End Summary.

The Legal Background
--------------


2. (U) Shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the
Government of Russia took steps to re-impose Soviet-era bans
on travel by foreigners to areas that were sensitive, mostly
for military reasons. Decree No. 470 of July 4, 1992
restricts foreigners from traveling to specific parts of
Siberia housing nuclear research facilities, parts of the
Russian Far East and Far North where military units were
deployed, certain parts of Kaliningrad and even parts of
Moscow district. The decree has been amended a number of
times since its inception.


3. (U) On March 21 PM Fradkov signed Decree No. 155 of 2006,
the operative paragraph of which adds to the list of
off-limits regions as follows:

Begin text of informal Embassy translation:

(Paragraph) 19. The Republic of North Ossetia-Alania (with
the exception of the Vladikavkaz Airport (Beslan) and the
cities of Vladikavkaz, Beslan, Alagir, and Ardon). Transit
travel is permitted on the automobile routes
Nazran-Beslan-Nalchik (Autoroute M-29),Verkhnyy
Lars-Vladikavkaz (Automobile Road A-301),Nizhniy
Zaramag-Alagir (Automobile Road R-297),
Alagir-Ardon-Autoroute M-29 (Automobile Road R-298); on
automobile roads connecting Vladikavkaz with Autoroute M-29
and the automobile road connecting Vladikavkaz Airport
(Beslan) with Autoroute M-29; and on the railroads
Nazran-Beslan-Murtazovo, Vladikavkaz-Beslan,
Alagir-Elkhotovo, and Gudermes-Mozdok-Prokhladnoye.

End text.

Decree 155 instructs the Russian MFA to transmit this text to
diplomatic missions in Moscow. The MFA did so only on June
15 via Note no. 3295. Local authorities in North Ossetia
signaled to international organizations based in Vladikavkaz
that they would begin enforcing the travel ban in June. No
procedures were made available to request authorization to
travel to off-limits areas.


Federal Focus on Georgia...
--------------


4. (C) Local and international observers to whom we have
spoken in the Caucasus and in Moscow can think of only one
reason for Russia's Federal Government to impose such
restrictions: tensions with Georgia. The order was signed
two days after imposition of a politically-motivated ban on
the import of Georgian wine. It came after numerous
occasions when UN international employees, hiking in the
Caucasus Mountains (along with North Ossetian EmerCom
officials),ran into Russian military forces (as opposed to
border guards). Each time, the soldiers demanded that the
hikers return to Vladikavkaz, despite their official escorts.


5. (S) Restrictions on the presence of foreigners could
potentially help disguise military movements to the Georgian
border and/or into South Ossetia. The large Russian military
base at Mozdok is off-limits to foreigners, as are all
automobile roads leading to it. The road from Vladikavkaz to
the Roki Tunnel border with South Ossetia is open to transit
by foreigners as far south as Zaramag, but in fact there are
no destinations along that road permitted to foreigners south
of Alagir. The theory that the restrictions are designed to
disguise military movements is consistent with reports, from
OSCE observation and through other channels, that new heavy
weaponry is appearing in South Ossetia. The Georgian
Ambassador told us June 15 that in his view, based on the
June 13 meeting he attended between Presidents Putin and
Saakashvili, the Russians sincerely believe that the
Georgians are preparing for military action in South Ossetia.

MOSCOW 00006390 002 OF 002


He sensed that the Russians were confident of their
readiness to meet any such contingency. (Note: Russian
officials have often told us -- and said publicly -- that
Moscow takes seriously its "obligation" to protect Russian
citizens. Most inhabitants of South Ossetia now hold Russian
passports. End Note.)

...But Local Authorities Target Prigorodnyy
--------------


6. (C) There have been two known incidents in which the
travel ban has been enforced, and both were related to South
Ossetia's tense Prigorodnyy District. On June 6 a UN convoy
was turned back at the North Ossetian border as it tried to
enter from Ingushetia along a "non-approved" route -- the
route the UN had been using for ten years. The route, the
most direct road from Nazran to Vladikavkaz, passes through
Prigorodnyy. The approved route enters North Ossetia further
to the north and heads to Beslan (from where another approved
route leads south to Vladikavkaz),constituting a detour that
skirts most the Prigorodnyy district.


7. (C) During the week of June 12, the North Ossetian FSB
began to ban from the Prigorodnyy district Russian citizens
working for NGOs partnered with foreign assistance
organizations, including those implementing a USAID-funded
project. They cited a hitherto unknown rule that Prigorodnyy
was part of a "zone of counter-terrorist operations" which
demanded special local (in addition to federal) registration
of NGOs. Attempts by international assistance NGOs to meet
with North Ossetian officials on the issue have been rebuffed.


8. (C) Background: Prigorodnyy was originally part of
Ingushetia. When Stalin deported the Ingush to Central Asia
in 1944, Ossetia took it over and Ossetians occupied houses
left by the Ingush. When the Ingush were "rehabilitated" and
permitted to return in 1956, Ossetia held on to the district
-- and Ossetians remained in the former Ingush homes. Rising
tensions led to a brief war in 1992. Though several thousand
Ingush live in Prigorodnyy, none have reclaimed their homes.
Recently President Putin ordered the North Ossetian
Government to resolve the issue of Mayskiy, where Ingush IDPs
have been living in tents since 1992. The North Ossetian
authorities picked up the tents, transported the people to a
field two kilometers distant, put them back in the tents, and
declared that they had fulfilled Putin's order. Tensions
between Ingush and Ossetians have been growing since then.
It was in Mayskiy that the North Ossetian authorities began
banning the work of local NGOs.

Comment
--------------


9. (C) The restrictions will have a serious impact on
assistance organizations. Though North Ossetia is the least
vulnerable of the North Caucasus republics, it has attracted
an inordinate amount of assistance. That appears to be the
result of most aid organizations having their regional
headquarters there, as well as from the outpouring of
sympathy in the wake of the Beslan tragedy. Some
international assistance projects appear to gratify local
sentiment in support of South Ossetian separatists -- e.g.,
economic assistance to Ossetian refugees who fled Georgia in

1992. The area in which assistance inside North Ossetia is
clearly necessary is to lower tensions in Prigorodnyy -- the
one place from which local authorities are insistently
banning international NGOs and their local partners.


10. (C) Even more serious, however, is what this move could
mean for Russian-Georgian relations. It comes amid rising
tensions across the board over the last few months,
especially over South Ossetia. It also comes amid rumors
heard throughout the assistance community in North Ossetia
that the GOR is building refugee camps there to house a new
wave of refugees expected from South Ossetia. Russians cite
the deployment of Georgia's largest U.S.-trained unit to Gori
and the construction of a new military hospital there as
evidence of Georgian intentions. The moves Russia is making
to counter these perceived Georgian intentions will lead in
turn to increased Georgian suspicion of Russia's intentions.
Expected Georgian parliamentary action on Russia's PKO in
South Ossetia will only add to this cycle of distrust.
BURNS