Georgia protests against Russian official visiting Abkhazia without prior agreement

Photo: Georgia protests against Russian official visiting Abkhazia without prior agreement

The Foreign Ministry summoned the Russian ambassador to hand him a protest note against last week's visit to Abkhazia by Viktor Ozerov, chairman of the Defense and Security Committee of the Russian parliament's upper house.

Ozerov had said that Georgia's possible withdrawal from a loose grouping of 12 ex-Soviet republics did not necessarily mean Abkhazia would also pull out of the alliance.

The ministry said such statements "harm the peaceful process of conflict settlement, and are yet another attempt of encroaching on Georgia's sovereignty and territorial integrity."

The note also asked Russian parliament, the State Duma, to clarify Ozerov's statements.

Abkhazia broke away from the Georgian government in a bloody separatist war in the early 1990's. The Black Sea region is not recognized internationally, but has cultivated closer ties with Russia.

President Mikhail Saakashvili has vowed to return the province and another separatist region, South Ossetia, into the fold, the AP reports.

In another sign of growing tensions between Tbilisi and Moscow, an exiled opposition leader said Tuesday he planned to visit Moscow in the near future, after senior Russian officials said he could by granted political asylum there, the AP reports.

Former State Security Minister Igor Georgadze is wanted in Georgia for alleged involvement in an assassination attempt against Saakashvili's predecessor, Eduard Shevardnadze.

The Interfax news agency quoted Georgadze as saying he planned to arrive in Moscow on Wednesday. The report did not mention his whereabouts.