Thursday, June 6 2013

Tbilisi. Development of commercial ties between
Russia and Georgia, as well as visa facilitation for Georgian citizens, will be
discussed at the meeting between the Russian State Secretary, First Deputy
Foreign Minister, Grigory Karasin and Georgian Premier's Special Representative
for Relations with Russia, Zurab Abashidze, in Prague (Czech Republic), on
Wednesday, June 5.

This will be the third meeting between the
Special Representatives of Moscow and Tbilisi since the break- off of the
diplomatic relations between the countries, in 2008. The first meeting was held
in Geneva, on December 14, last year. The second meeting was held on March 1,
2013, in Prague. Since that time, Russia and Georgia have agreed on resumption
of supplies of Borjomi mineral water to the Russian market. Five Georgian
companies have already submitted applications for excise stamps for the
resumption of export of the Georgian wine. After the second meeting, there came
reports that the Russian Federation might facilitate visa regime for certain
categories of Georgian citizens. As Abashidze stated, he was going to raise the
visa facilitation issue at the third meeting in Prague.

"It was stated a few months ago that
Moscow was considering possible facilitation of visa regime for the certain
categories of Georgian citizens. Maybe we will learn something new now,"
Abashidze stated.

In the Georgian Special Representative's
words, the sides have determined the range of issues to be discussed at the
meeting - that is, commercial ties, transport and humanitarian-cultural issues.

"On my part, it will be probably hard
to overlook the situation on the administrative boundary line in Tskhinvali
region. This issue has been in focus at Geneva Security Discussions, but there
are some humanitarian issues, which we, of course, will not be able to discuss
in details, but we cannot ignore them either," Abashidze said.

According to the Georgian Foreign
Minister, last week Russian border guards installed barbed wire fences near
Ditsi village, Gori district and Dvani village, Kareli district, bordering
Tskhinvali region (breakaway region of Georgia).  Earlier, the ministry said that barbed wire
had been drawn in Didi Khurvaleti, Gugutiantkari, Kvemo Nikozi, Tamarasheni,
Dvani and Atotsi villages, which did not allow the population to carry out
agricultural works. As official Tbilisi reported, shifting of separation line
on certain sections deep into the territory of Georgia had been also observed.

Russian foreign Ministry, in turn, claimed
Tbilisi was deliberately heating up tension around the situation on the border
with South Ossetia and linked that to the campaign ahead of the presidential
elections in Georgia, scheduled for October this year.

Grigory Karasin, in turn, said he was not
going to discuss with Abashidze the Russian border guards' actions in
Tskhinvali region.

"At the meetings with Zurab Abashidze
we do not touch upon any issues related to South Ossetia and Abkhazia. We deal
with the spheres in Russian-Georgian relations, in which, we believe, some
measures can be found for achieving progress in certain issues," Russian
diplomat stated.

In Karasin's words, everything that the
Russian border guards do on the territory of the so-called South Ossetia has
been directly ordered by the de-facto authorities of the region, since they
(Russian border guards) have been deployed there on the basis of bilateral
state agreement.

Georgia's new government, which came to
power as a result of October 1, 2012, parliamentary elections in Georgia, has
named normalization of ties with the Russian Federation as country's key
foreign policy priority.