Abkhazia

However, Georgia's determination to not only protect its territorial integrity but also to impose homogenization on the Abkhazians and South Ossetians pushed them to seek integration with Russia.

The offices of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the Abkhazian capital Sukhumi (above) look like offices anywhere else in the world.

Georgian State Minister stressed that the new government's policy would be directed at de-isolation of Abkhazians and

It is generally thought that Abkhazians living in Turkey number twice as many as those who live in Abkhazia.

This was one of the major goals that we set at that time and at the same time we were trying to use the international community, the European Union, and their donorship to help facilitate and implement the processes in economic, cultural and other relations, which would also help the Georgian and Abkhazian societies get closer and only after that we'd touch upon the status-related issues.

Ossetia; the Abkhazians have raised no objections to Mingrelians staying in, or returning to, the south-easternmost province of Gal, where, whatever the (disputed) ethnic origins of these locals, there had been a preponderance of Mingrelian-speakers for decades, and Svans who did not take up arms against Abkhazians during the war or thereafter are free to live in their homesteads in the K'odor Valley.

From the Abkhazians of the Northwest Caucasus to the Zunghars, a nomadic Mongol people destroyed by the Qing emperors of China, this two-volume encyclopedia contains some 400 entries providing information on the major cultural groups that live and have lived in the Asia- Pacific region from ancient times to the present.

And according to them it was not just Abkhazians but also Russians soldiers patroling the area.

I also believe that American academics and politicians are making a serious error by casting Russia as the demon of the Caucasus, when the ethnic issues between Georgians and Abkhazians are complex, requiring diplomatic finesse rather than calls to confrontation.

Despite government propaganda, the region's people must remember that Russians are not superior to Georgians, Georgians to Ossetians or Abkhazians, and so on.

By doing this, he destroyed with his own hands all hopes for South Ossetians, Abkhazians and Georgians to live together peacefully as part of one state, added Medvedev.

The right of South Ossestians and Abkhazians to independence is also fully justified under the UN Charter and customary international laws and norms - in contrast to Kosovo, an "integral part" of Serbia.

Hundreds of jubilant Ossetians and Abkhazians spilled into the streets yesterday, waving national flags and firing shots in the air.

Hundreds of jubilant Ossetians and Abkhazians spilled onto the streets in their regional capitals after his announcement, waving national flags, firing shots in the air, cheering and dancing.

The 70,000 rebellious South Ossetians and the quarter of a million Abkhazians provide an excellent reason for Russia to maintain its influence on this part of its southern border by keeping the Georgian government in Tblisi unstable.