Kyrgyz & Uzbek clashes in OSH… no one wins…

No one wins… what a waste.

Shahrul Peshawar

stop ethnic genocide in Osh! Uzbek & Kyrgyz are brothers

Why should this happened?  Is there any invisible hands involved? or is there any provocateur taking advantage on the newly formed interim government? 

I was in Osh somewhere in 1995, a very nice place full with nice people, located in Ferghana Valley, the bed of Islamic movement in the region.  Stop fighting, concentrate on nation building.

Shahrul Peshawar, Kota Bharu

Kyrgyzstan asks Russia to help quell ethnic clashes

By Hulkar Isamova Hulkar Isamova – 1 hr 36 mins ago

OSH, Kyrgyzstan (Reuters) – Kyrgyzstan appealed for Russia’s help on Saturday to stop ethnic fighting that has killed at least 75 and left parts of its second-largest city in flames, the worst violence since the president was toppled in April.

The interim government in Kyrgyzstan, which hosts U.S. and Russian military bases, said it was powerless to stop armed gangs from burning down the homes and businesses of ethnic Uzbeks in parts of Osh. Gun battles raged throughout the night.

Violence and shooting spread to the neighboring region of Jalalabad, scene of deadly clashes last month.

“We need the entry of outside armed forces to calm the situation down,” interim government leader Roza Otunbayeva told reporters. “We have appealed to Russia for help and I have already signed such a letter for President Dmitry Medvedev.”

Russia said now was not the time to intervene.

“It is an internal conflict and for now Russia does not see the conditions for taking part in its resolution,” Natalya Timakova, Medvedev’s spokeswoman, was quoted as saying by Interfax news agency.

Kyrgyzstan, a poor former Soviet state of 5.3 million people, declared a state of emergency in Osh and several rural districts early on Friday after rival ethnic gangs fought each other with guns, iron bars and petrol bombs.

Renewed turmoil in Kyrgyzstan will fuel concern in Russia, the United States and neighbor China. Washington uses an air base at Manas in the north of the country, about 300 km (190 miles) from Osh, to supply its forces in Afghanistan.

The Kyrgyz Health Ministry said at least 75 people had been killed — six of them in Jalalabad — and nearly 1,000 wounded in the violence in the southerly power base of former president Kurmanbek Bakiyev, deposed by a popular revolt.

Otunbayeva said the eventual toll was likely to be greater.

REFERENDUM PLAN

Otunbayeva accused supporters of Bakiyev — like her, an ethnic Kyrgyz — of stoking the violence to disrupt her government’s plans to hold a national referendum on June 27 to vote on changes to the constitution.

“This event shows that the push by these people to turn backwards is extraordinarily great,” she said.

She added more reinforcements would be sent to Osh. The interim government has already deployed troops and armored vehicles and declared a night-time curfew in Osh, to no avail.

The curfew was extended to Jalalabad region on Saturday.

“There is shooting, clashes. People are gathering … trying to build blocks, barricades. The police are patrolling,” government spokesman Farid Niyazov said of Jalalabad.

“These are echoes of the events in Osh.”

Interim government deputy chairman Omurbek Tekebayev called for peace between the Uzbeks and the Kyrgyz, saying they are “brotherly nations” who share a religion and similar languages.

The Uzbek Foreign Ministry expressed “great concern” about the events in Osh, saying there were “reasons to conclude that such events are organized, managed and provocational.”

A Reuters correspondent in Osh said gun battles were still taking place in an Uzbek neighborhood. Gas was shut off to Osh and some neighborhoods had no electricity.

“Everywhere is burning: Uzbek homes, restaurants and cafes. The whole town is covered in smoke,” said local human rights worker Dilmurad Ishanov, an ethnic Uzbek.

“We don’t need the Kyrgyz authorities. We need Russia. We need troops. We need help.”

The European Union said it would send its special representative for Central Asia, Pierre Morel.

Asked about possible Russian help, an EU spokesman said, “We would welcome any effort from one of our international partners to help the situation in Kyrgyzstan.”

Otunbayeva said Osh was also facing a humanitarian crisis as food was running out. She said her government had decided to open the border to Uzbekistan to allow fleeing Uzbeks to escape, although it was not clear who controlled the frontier.

One witness said some women and children had made it across to the Uzbek town of Marhamat, 60 km (38 miles) from Osh, and camps had been set up for those without family in Uzbekistan.

Russia offered humanitarian aid and sent in a helicopter with doctors to fly out some of the wounded, the Kremlin said.

ETHNIC VIOLENCE

Kyrgyzstan, which won independence with the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, has been in turmoil since the revolt that toppled Bakiyev on April 7, kindling fears of civil war.

Supporters of Bakiyev, now in exile in Belarus, briefly seized government buildings in the south on May 13, defying Otunbayeva’s central authorities in Bishkek.

The latest clashes are the worst ethnic violence since 1990, when then-Kremlin leader Mikhail Gorbachev sent in Soviet troops after hundreds of people were killed in and around Osh.

This time, Russia said it would discuss the situation within in the security bloc of former Soviet republics known as the Collective Security Treaty Organization on Monday.

Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan intertwine in the Fergana Valley. While Uzbeks make up 14.5 percent of the Kyrgyz population, the two groups are roughly equal in the Osh and Jalalabad regions.

The government now faces a major test in trying to reassert control, said Lilit Gevorgyan at IHS Global Insight, “The explosive combination of a counter-revolution and an ethnic conflict poses the greatest threat to the future of the Kyrgyz revolution.”

(Additional reporting by Olga Dzyubenko in Bishkek, Robin Paxton in Almaty, Toni Vorobyova in Moscow and Philip Blenkinsop in Brussels; Writing by Robin Paxton; Editing by Louise Ireland)

Drop Charges against Oleg Orlov

Oleg Orlov.

(Moscow) – Russian authorities should immediately drop criminal libel charges against Oleg Orlov, the prominent activist who heads Memorial Human Rights Center, Human Rights Watch said today. The charges stem from Orlov’s statement that Ramzan Kadyrov, the president of Chechnya, was responsible for the murder of Natalia Estemirova, Memorial’s leading researcher in Chechnya.

“Criminal penalties for libel are disproportionate and have a chilling effect on free expression in Russia,” said Allison Gill, Moscow director for Human Rights Watch. “Kadyrov has already had his day in court over this issue.”

The decision to bring a criminal case was made public on October 27, 2009. If convicted, Orlov faces up to three years in prison.

Kadyrov brought civil defamation charges against Orlov and Memorial, suing for 10 million rubles in damages (approximately US$300,000). On October 6, 2009, a Moscow court ruled that Orlov’s statement defamed Kadyrov and ordered Orlov and Memorial to pay a total of 70,000 rubles (approximately US$2,400) and publish a retraction that the statement “does not correspond to reality.”

Orlov and Memorial have appealed that ruling and have stated their intention to appeal to the European Court of Human Rights if necessary. The European Court has previously ruled, in Kazakov v. Russia, that “to make someone retract his or her own opinion by acknowledging his or her own wrongness is a doubtful form of redress and does not appear to be ‘necessary.'”

Human Rights Watch said that the current case against Orlov highlights the need to bring Russia’s laws in line with its international obligations to protect freedom of expression. Russia and Azerbaijan remain the only two Council of Europe member states to make libel a criminal offense.

In determining whether Orlov’s statements were libelous, the court will need to take into account the standards applicable under Russia’s human rights obligations, especially the need to protect freedom of expression, Human Rights Watch said. The threshold for criticism of a public official is much higher than for a private individual, Human Rights Watch noted.

“Freedom to criticize officials, even accuse them of wrongdoing, is important to fostering public debate and to holding officials accountable,” Gill said. “The threat of criminal sanction to restrict speech strikes at the very essence of what it means to be a free society.”

Estemirova was abducted outside her home in Grozny, the capital of Chechnya, on July 15 and was found shot dead in the neighboring republic of Ingushetia later the same day.

The nature of Estemirova’s investigations into official abuses, the circumstances of her murder, and  the  pattern of threats against her, Memorial, and investigative journalists and human rights defenders in Chechnya all point to possible official involvement in or acquiescence to her murder.

Human Rights Watch warned that the Russian authorities should not allow the suit to distract from their responsibility to investigate Estemirova’s killing thoroughly and impartially and to identify and prosecute those responsible.

Human rights groups have documented serious human rights violations committed by law enforcement and security personnel under Kadyrov’s de facto control. These violations, committed in a counterinsurgency campaign, include illegal detention, torture, extrajudicial executions, and home-burnings of individuals they accuse of being involved in or supportive of the insurgency. Those who document and publicize these crimes have faced violence, threats, and harassment.

Estemirova’s murder was followed three weeks later by the killings of Zarema Sadulayeva and her husband, Alik Dzhabrailov, civic activists who worked for Save the Generation, a charity that provides humanitarian assistance to war victims. Sadulayeva and Dzhabrailov were abducted from their Grozny office by law enforcement personnel on August 10 and found shot the next day. In the months since Estemirova’s murder, several Memorial staff who work on Chechnya have faced threats and intimidation.

The announcement of the criminal charges comes just days before the European Union and Russia will hold their bi-annual human rights consultations. Human Rights Watch urged the European Union to seize the opportunity of the talks, scheduled for November 5 and 6 in Stockholm, to press Russia to protect human rights defenders and to seek a commitment from Russia to bring its libel laws in line with its international obligations to protect free expression.

The European Union and the United States should further urge the Russian government to demonstrate its commitment to openness and accountability by securing immediate and unfettered access to Russia, including to the North Caucasus, for international monitors who have long sought such access. These include the Council of Europe Parliamentary Assembly rapporteur on legal remedies for human rights violations in the North Caucasus, and UN special rapporteurs on torture, extrajudicial executions, and human rights defenders.

“If anything, the charges against Orlov should remind Russia’s partners of the urgent need to protect human rights defenders in Russia,” Gill said. “The EU should seize the chance to press Russia for an effective, credible, and transparent investigation into Estemirova’s murder.

Ingushetia in ‘state of civil war’

Posted by: “Robert” rpg7@poczta.fm   garg997

Sun Nov 23, 2008 6:20 pm (PST)

Page last updated at 00:37 GMT, Sunday, 23 November 2008

By Richard Galpin
BBC News, Moscow

Human rights activists and opposition politicians in Russia’s southern republic of Ingushetia have told the BBC that the predominantly Muslim region is now in a state of civil war.

It is reported that more than 800 people have been killed in an escalating conflict which originally spilt over from neighbouring Chechnya six years ago.

Ingushetia is a tiny region with a total population of just 300,000.

“A lot of my human rights colleagues and politicians say it is now a civil war and I agree with that,” Magomed Mutsolgov, director of the Ingush Human Rights organisation Mashr, says.

“In my opinion it is a war between the security forces and the local population. Many members of the security forces consider themselves above the law and the population outside the law,” he adds.

A low-level insurgency involving Muslim fighters escalated dramatically last year with a surge of attacks on the security forces and also on people who have moved into the region from other parts of
Russia.

“From July or August last year there have been three or four attacks every week,” Tanya Lokshina, of Human Rights Watch, says.  She recently compiled a major report on Ingushetia.

“There are a few hundred insurgents in total… who are Jihadists fighting to establish a Caliphate in the (Caucasus) region.”

Moscow’s response has been heavy-handed, with reports that an extra 2,500 troops from outside Ingushetia were deployed in the republic last year to help crush what Russia sees as a Muslim rebellion.

But this has only added fuel to the fire which is driving ever more young Ingush men into the arms of the rebels.

‘Destroying everything’

The military and other security services including the FSB, the successor to the KGB, have long stood accused of committing gross human rights violations against the Ingush population – such as kidnapping and torture.

But last year, according to Human Rights Watch, the security forces were also responsible for a wave of extra-judicial killings.

Human Rights Watch says 40 people were killed without any proof they had anything to do with the insurgency.

On a dirt track on the outskirts of the main town, Nazran, Jamaldin Gardanov showed me the spot where he says his brother Hamzat was shot through the head by a Russian soldier in August.

He told me Hamzat had been driving home with his cousin after buying some paint in town.

“My brother and his cousin were passing a checkpoint set up after a policeman was killed on the main road,” he said.

“The car turned down here (into the dirt track) and the security forces opened fire with intent to kill.

“My brother died on the spot and his cousin ran off through the fields. The police then fired on the fields for two hours destroying everything.

“I’m 36-years-old and far from being a fighter, but young men of 18 and 19 want to avenge these killings. For some it’s a Jihad against Russia,” he said.

Back at Jamaldin’s house we met Hamzat’s widow and her two children.  Jamaldin is now looking after them all.

Over lunch he showed me photographs of a raid on his house by Russian soldiers at the beginning of this month.

One of the pictures shows a young child standing outside the house in front of an armoured personnel carrier.

“My wife and children were standing outside for three hours as they searched our house,” he said.

“They claim we are all Wahhabis”, he said, “so we are being persecuted.”

Jamaldin does come from a family of theologians and is deeply religious, but he strongly denies any links to radical Islam.

“The security forces have created the threat of Wahhabism as a cover for what they are doing here,” he said.

He then showed us some shocking clips of video stored on his mobile phone.

In the first we could see a close-up of a man’s head covered in blood.

This was another of Jamaldin’s brothers, 21-year-old Adam. Jamaldin says he was also shot dead by the security forces.

The second mobile phone video shows the incident, which happened in the centre of Nazran, in February last year.

It was filmed by someone inside the main administration building, looking down on the square where Adam and a friend had been sitting in a car.

The video shows what looks very much like a soldier pulling the bodies from the vehicle.

Jamaldin says the prosecutor told him off the record that his brother Adam was “absolutely clean”, there was no reason for him to have been killed.

The family believes Adam may have been targeted simply because he was a devout Muslim who had studied in Egypt.

Torture victim

Later, in a safe location, we met up with another victim of the security forces’ dirty war in Ingushetia.

23-year-old Tamerlan could barely get out of the car when he arrived at our meeting-point.

He had just been released after being detained for six days by the security forces in the northern town of Maglobek.

He had been picked up with three friends following the murder of a policeman in the town.

When we got inside, he pulled up his jumper to reveal a cluster of deep bruises and cuts around his lower back.

He said he was also badly bruised on his upper thighs and he had marks on his wrists.

“They tortured me from six in the morning to six in the evening,” he said.

“They put a sack over my head and beat me so badly I lost consciousness. They put sharp implements under my nails. I thought I was going to die, it was sadistic.

“They also tied my hands and feet together and hung me up – so I started to suffocate.”

He says the security forces were trying to get him to confess to involvement in the policeman’s murder but had to release him because he knew nothing about it.

He told me he had no connection with the rebels.

“Maybe they detained me because I’m a Muslim and pray at the Mosque and my wife wears the Hijab,” he said.

According to the mainstream opposition leader Maksharip Aushev, this brutal treatment of the local population is not only swelling the ranks of the rebel fighters.

“People are coming to me all the time, saying let’s vote for independence, ” he says.

“If we had a referendum, 80% of the population would vote to leave Russia,” he adds.

In a sign of mounting panic back in Moscow, the Kremlin suddenly announced three weeks ago that the former KGB officer Murat Zyazikov, who had been in charge of Ingushetia since 2002, was being replaced.

The new man is a career soldier, Yunus-Bek Yevkurov, who made his name during the wars in Chechnya.

He turned down our request for an interview.

The most senior politician in the region who was prepared to speak to us was the chairman of the local parliament’s security committee, Mukhtar Buzurtanov.

He said Yunus-Bek Yevkurov must bring the security forces under control and stop what he called their “illegal activities”.

But he also accused the rebels of trying to destabilise Russia, saying they were part of a radical Islamic movement which had moved into Ingushetia after the wars in Chechnya.

He added that more than 50 soldiers had been killed so far this year.

Other senior officials in the local government have been quoted as saying they have to mount security operations to eliminate the rebels because of the threat they pose to Moscow’s rule over the region.

The arrival of a new leader of Ingushetia who is a battle-hardened soldier and veteran of the Chechen conflict may sound ominous.

But the top opposition politician Maksharip Aushev holds out some hope that Yunus-Bek Yevkurov could improve the situation.

“The former leader Zyazikov was 100% to blame (for the situation). The first thing (new leader Yunus- Bek Yevkurov) did was to invite us to meet him and he said he plans to stop the human rights abuses and tackle corruption. At the moment we see no reason not to trust him.”

So far there have not been any signs of change and the violence and abuses have continued.

“We will give [Mr Yevkurov] a maximum of three months,” Mr Aushev says.

“We will support him if things change, if not it will go back to the situation as it was before.”

Uzbekistan Delivers Humanitarian Aid to Kyrgyz Republic

photo origin:  http://www.pbase.com/giovannacampello/image/49143424

Uzbekistan delivered 400 tonnes of humanitarian aid for US$201,000 to Kyrgyz Republic, the Uzbek Embassy in Kyrgyz Republic said in a statement.

The humanitarian aid was delivered in accordance with the resolution of the Uzbek President Islam Karimov on providing humanitarian aid to the people of the Kyrgyz Republic, who suffered from the earthquake on 5 October.

The earthquake with an epicenter in Nura village of Alay district of Osh region brought serious damage to Kyrgyzstan and claimed 74 lives, including children.

The Uzbek Embassy said that the humanitarian aid was delivered to Kyrgyz Republic on 9 October and 10 October. Fourty-four vehicles supplied aid to Osh region of Kyrgyz Republic.

The humanitarian aid includes various construction materials to the earthquake-hit region, including 120 tonnes of cement, foodstuffs, including 60 tonnes of flour, a tonne of vegetable oil, as well as blankets, knitwear, children’s clothes and other goods of first necessity.

Shahrul Peshawar – Well done.  A good neighbor will never let her neighbor suffer.

Georgia accuses Russia of breaking truce

Georgia said one of its policemen was shot dead from a Russian position Wednesday in violation of a fragile truce, as a major crack appeared in the EU-brokered ceasefire over the remit of EU observers.

The Georgians said it was the first fatal shooting since the August 12 ceasefire that brought an end to the five-day war between Georgia and Russia over Georgia’s breakaway region of South Ossetia.

“This is the first time that Georgian police or military personnel have been shot at since the ceasefire began,” Georgian interior ministry spokesman Shota Utiashvili told AFP.

Vano ShlamovAn unnamed spokesman for the Russian forces in South Ossetia quoted by Interfax denied the incident and said he would not believe it until the Georgians showed him the body.

Georgia’s interior ministry told AFP the officer died in hospital from wounds to the head and throat after being fired on near Karaleti, a key Russian position on the road from the Georgian city of Gori to South Ossetia.

Utiashvili said it was unclear whether the shots had been fired by Russian forces or by Moscow-backed South Ossetian militants.

The Georgian foreign ministry reacted furiously, accusing the Russians of gross ceasefire violations.

Russia’s “armed forces not only do not comply with the political commitments undertaken by their president… but go as far as to completely disregard them thus causing the death of innocent people,” the ministry said.

Georgia’s August 7 offensive to regain control of South Ossetia from Moscow-backed separatists prompted a massive retaliatory thrust by Russia into Georgian territory from which thousands of Russian troops have yet to withdraw.

Russia argues that it repelled Georgian troops to protect thousands of people whom it had granted Russian citizenship since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union. The West accuses it of seeking to redraw the map by effectively annexing part of its ex-Soviet neighbour.

Hundreds of people on both sides are estimated to have been killed in the conflict. Tens of thousands fled their homes.

In Moscow on Wednesday, Russia ruled out allowing EU observers into South Ossetia and a second Georgian breakaway region, Abkhazia.

The move directly contradicted claims by French President Nicolas Sarkozy and threw into doubt a new peace plan the current EU chief had brokered just two days previously with Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev.

“Additional international observers will be deployed precisely around South Ossetia and Abkhazia and not inside these republics,” Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told journalists in Moscow.

Medvedev committed on Monday to withdraw within a month all Russian troops from Georgia apart from those in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, and to allow the deployment of 200 EU observers.

Sarkozy, speaking at the head of an EU delegation early Tuesday alongside Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili in Tbilisi, said: “The spirit of the text is that they (the EU observers) will have a mandate to enter (Abkhazia and South Ossetia), to observe, to report.”

EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, also part of the EU delegation, said Wednesday that the location of the observers had not been discussed during talks, but that access to the territories was clearly in the “spirit” of the agreements.

Russia has tightened control over Abkhazia and South Ossetia since the ceasefire, recognising them as independent states, establishing diplomatic relations and vowing to keep 7,600 troops there long-term.

The opening of ties on Tuesday drew a furious response in the Georgian capital Tbilisi where Deputy Foreign Minister Giga Bokeria described it as “yet another step in the annexation of Georgia’s sovereign territories.”

Washington, which has consistently taken a tougher line with Moscow over the crisis than most of its European allies, on Wednesday condemned the plan to keep troops in the rebel regions.

The plan is a “clear violation” of both the August truce and previous accords, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.

Russia sets up diplomatic relations with Abkhazia and South Ossetia

Russia has officially established diplomatic relations with Abkhazia and South Ossetia. This fact was announced by Sergey Lavrov, Minister for Foreign Affairs of Russia, at today’s press conference in Moscow.

“We have exchanged notes, which have summed up our arrangements on establishment of diplomatic relations of Russia with Abkhazia and of Russia with South Ossetia,” said Mr Lavrov on the outcomes of the meeting with his colleagues from Abkhazia and South Ossetia Sergey Shamba and Murat Dzhioev.

“We have ascertained our consent with the prepared drafts, put our visas to the texts of these documents; and they are now ready for signing in the top level, which will take place soon,” the “Mayak” Radio quotes Sergey Lavrov as saying.

The Russian Minister has also stated that Russia insisted that Abkhazia and South Ossetia take part in international debates on settlement of the situation in the Caucasus to start on October 15 in Geneva.

“The participants of these debates were not listed in the document, but we have clearly fixed that South Ossetia and Abkhazia shall have their equal seats at the table of such debates,” said Mr Lavrov.

The head of the Russian MFA has noted that one of the main topics of the debates will be the issues of ensuring safety and stability in the region, the RIA “Novosti” reports.

Georgia/Russian Federation: ICRC moves closer to gaining access to South Ossetia

Following a positive meeting on 19 August between the ICRC’s president, Jakob Kellenberger and the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, the organization is hopeful that it will soon be granted access to South Ossetia. The following is the latest update on ICRC activities in Georgia and North Ossetia.

The ICRC’s key priority remains gaining safe and unimpeded access to all areas affected by the conflict, in particular South Ossetia, as well as isolated villages near Gori, which were cut off by the fighting. The ICRC’s President, Jakob Kellenberger, had a positive meeting with the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, on 19 August during which the Russian authorities said they believed that the ICRC’s presence and work in South Ossetia would be useful. They said that they would emphasize this again to the South Ossetian authorites. The organization remains ready to go to South Ossetia, and has the staff and facilities needed to make a rapid and substantial contribution to efforts already underway to tackle humanitarian needs there. The ICRC is discussing practicalities with the South Ossetian authorities and is hoping to have access to South Ossetia as soon as possible.

The ICRC continues to provide medical assistance to the war wounded and is distributing emergency assistance to affected people, especially those displaced or isolated by the conflict in both Georgia and North Ossetia. A top priority is reaching out to the most vulnerable – the elderly and the sick – who were isolated or unable to flee when the fighting broke out. Providing safe drinking water, access to sanitation facilities, food and other basic items, such as blankets and buckets, are also top priorities. Finally, gaining access to all persons arrested or captured in connection with the conflict remains another key priority.

Prisoner exchange

The ICRC was contacted on the evening of 18 August by the Georgian authorities and invited to be present, as a neutral intermediary, on the morning of 19 August, at the handover of Russian and Georgian Prisoners of War (PoWs) about 50 kilometres from Tbilisi. The ICRC was present but not involved. From the Georgian side, five PoWs, including the two wounded Russian pilots previously visited by the ICRC, were handed over. From the Russian side, the ICRC was told that either 20 or 21 Georgian PoWs, including three previously visited by the ICRC in Vladikavkaz on 17 August, were handed over.

Acting as a neutral intermediary in relation to prisoner releases is part of the ICRC’s work among its delegations across the world. The ICRC is present to ensure that the handover is done in accordance with international humanitarian law (IHL).

Supplying food and medical assistance

The last initial air bridge shipment from the ICRC’s logistics centre in Amman took place on Tuesday, 19 August. The ICRC remains on stand-by to send further shipments if needed. As of 19 August, the ICRC will have delivered 445 tonnes of assistance, including food, blankets, medicine and water treatment equipment, to Tbilisi by air (9 plane loads carrying 335 tonnes) and road (truckloads containing 110 tonnes).

Visit of ICRC President

On 17 August, the ICRC’s president, Jakob Kellenberger, arrived in Tbilisi. He visited a collective centre for displaced people near the capital to get a first-hand look at the situation they are facing. Mr. Kellenberger was in the North Ossetian city of Vladikavkaz on Monday 18 August, where he also met with people who had fled their homes due to the fighting. Some people are returning home from North Ossetia to South Ossetia, however it is difficult to assess how many without having access to all areas. On Tuesday, 19 August, Mr Kellenberger met with the Russian Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, in Moscow.

Distributing assistance to Gori and surrounding villages

The ICRC continued its work in the Georgian town of Gori on Monday, where increasing numbers of people can be seen out on the street. ICRC delegates say that they have been approached by many residents, mainly elderly, asking for food and medicine. They have described residents as looking bewildered and emotionally drained. One of the ICRC’s top priorities is to gain access to villages around Gori, where people may remain isolated and injured, especially elderly persons. Around 1,000 people have received food and non-food items from the ICRC in Gori so far.

Health – delivering supplies for war wounded and visiting hospitals

The ICRC delivered three war wounded kits to the hospital in the Georgian town of Kutaisi on Monday, as well as one to the hospital in Kareli. Medical assessment teams from both Tbilisi and Zugdidi were also able to visit the Kutaisi on Monday.

Restoring access to safe drinking water

ICRC teams in and around Tbilisi continue to restore water connections at the collective centres sheltering people who were forced to flee their homes. The centres are mainly abandoned public buildings, so the ICRC is working to ensure functioning water connections. This includes fixing pipes and sewage systems. On 18 August, the ICRC began distributing cooking stoves to displaced families so they can cook the rice they have received. Water and sanitation issues remain a concern in some of the collective centres.

Gaining access to detainees

In accordance with the ICRC’s mandate, the organization has officially requested access from both the Russian and Georgian authorities to all persons arrested or captured in connection with the conflict. The ICRC has been able to visit two wounded Russian pilots held by the Georgian authorities on several separate occasions. On 17 August, the ICRC was granted access to three wounded Georgian prisoners of war held by the Russian Armed Forces. They had the opportunity to speak with their relatives by phone during calls facilitated by the ICRC and filled out Red Cross messages.

Access to South Ossetia / restoring family links

The ICRC’s tracing delegates continue to hear from people who are very worried about the relatives they left behind, especially in South Ossetia. Many are concerned about their elderly relatives, who were unable to flee when the fighting started. Until the ICRC has safe and unimpeded access to all affected areas, it is difficult to have a full picture of the scale of the humanitarian needs.

Georgia: International Groups Should Send Missions

Investigate Violations and Protect Civilians

(Tbilisi, August 18, 2008) – Mounting evidence that Russian and Georgian military used armed force unlawfully during the South Ossetian conflict highlights the need for international fact-finding missions in Georgia, Human Rights Watch said today. Ongoing militia attacks and a growing humanitarian crisis also indicate the urgent need for the deployment of a mission to enhance civilian protection.

An international security mission should be deployed to help protect civilians and create a safe environment for the displaced to return home. And international organizations should also send fact-finding missions to establish the facts, report on human rights, and urge the authorities to account for any crimes. Rachel Denber, Europe and Central Asia deputy director at Human Rights Watch.

At the start of the military conflict on August 7, 2008, Georgian military used indiscriminate and disproportionate force resulting in civilian deaths in South Ossetia. The Russian military has since used indiscriminate force in attacks in South Ossetia and in the Gori district, and has apparently targeted convoys of civilians attempting to flee the conflict zones. Ongoing looting, arson attacks, and abductions by militia are terrorizing the civilian population, forcing them to flee their homes and preventing displaced people from returning home.  
 
“This conflict has been a disaster for civilians,” said Rachel Denber, Europe and Central Asia deputy director at Human Rights Watch. “An international security mission should be deployed to help protect civilians and create a safe environment for the displaced to return home. And international organizations should also send fact-finding missions to establish the facts, report on human rights, and urge the authorities to account for any crimes.”  
 
Human Rights Watch called on the European Union, with the agreement of the parties, to deploy a robust European Security and Defense Policy (ESDP)mission consisting of police and security forces to ensure protection of civilians and the return of displaced persons to their homes.  
 
Human Rights Watch noted that there are a number of options open to the international community in relation to fact-finding missions. As a first step, the chairman-in-office of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) could send a special envoy to Georgia, including to South Ossetia, supported by a team of experts in international humanitarian law, to look at violations.  
 
Human Rights Watch also called on the United Nations to send a team to assess options for a fact-finding mission, and called for consideration to be given to using the International Humanitarian Fact Finding Commission established under Article 90 of Protocol I of the Geneva Conventions, to which both Georgia and Russia are party. Russia has already accepted the competence of the commission. This would be the first time that the commission would carry out an investigation in a conflict, and in line with the treaty provisions, it would have a mandate to investigate serious violations of International Humanitarian Law.  
 
Attacks by Russian forces  
 
In interviews with Georgians who fled South Ossetia and the Gori district following Russian forces’ assault on the area, Human Rights Watch has documented the Russian military’s use of indiscriminate force and its seemingly targeted attacks on civilians, including on a civilian convoy. The deliberate use of force against civilians or civilian objects is a war crime. Human Rights Watch has also confirmed the Russian military’s use of cluster bombs in two towns in Georgia (http://www.hrw.org/english/docs/2008/08/14/georgi19625.htm).  
 
Attacks in South Ossetia  
 
Slava Meranashvili, 32, from Kekhvi, an ethnic Georgian village in South Ossetia, north of the South Ossetian capital, Tskhinvali, told Human Rights Watch that his village was bombed by Russian jets several times. He told Human Rights Watch, “On August 9 or 10, massive bombing started and the village administration building and a hospital building were destroyed. Bombing took place day and night. It looked like they were targeting big buildings that could be housing the Georgian military.”  
 
Meranashvili’s house was next to a school that was bombed, but he said that no Georgian forces were housed there or were present near his house. He also told Human Rights Watch: “During the bombing on August 9, my uncle’s neighbor was killed. My uncle buried him in his backyard.”  
 
Meranashvili left Kekhvi on August 12, and described his flight: “We had to walk through the woods to Gori district villages and then our military helped us to evacuate. When we were walking through the woods, the bombing continued. I had to lie in swamps and crawl for hours. I was afraid to get up.”  
 
Human Rights Watch interviewed six civilians fleeing from different villages in South Ossetia in convoys of civilian cars on August 8. The convoys came under aerial bombardment, apparently by Russian military aircraft, near the village of Eredvi, along a road that bypasses Tskhinvali.  
 
Witnesses traveling in one convoy of several dozen cars told Human Rights Watch that around 4 p.m., five Russian aircraft flew over the convoy, then returned and opened fire. Temo Kasradze from the village of Kemerti, who was fleeing with his grandson, described the attack: “There were five people in our car. Suddenly [there was an] explosion. Perhaps four or five cars were hit. … I saw that people were injured and killed. There was blood.” Three witnesses described seeing two sisters traveling in a white Niva car killed in the attack. According to the witnesses, there were no military objects, military personnel or military vehicles on the road.  
 
At around 7 p.m. on August 8, Tengiz Magaldadze, 41, also from Kemerti, was driving the same route in a minivan with 20 other people. Just after they had turned onto the main road in Eredvi, Magaldadze saw three explosions about 20-25 meters in front of the vehicle. Magaldadze did not remember hearing any aircraft, but, because there were three explosions shortly after each other, he concluded they had been fired from an airplane.  
 
Also in the evening of August 8, Emzar Babutsidze traveled in a pickup truck with several other civilians on the bypass road in a convoy of three civilian cars. Less than two kilometers before a checkpoint manned by Russian forces, the pickup truck was hit by a shell, which killed the driver and the only woman in the car. Babutsidze believes the shell was fired from a BMP-2 infantry fighting vehicle. The passengers put the remains of the driver and the woman in the trunk of one car and took them to Gori hospital before driving on to Tbilisi.  
 
Attacks in Gori district  
 
As the Russian military advanced into the district and city of Gori, they launched attacks that killed civilians in their homes and as they were preparing to flee.  
 
Vasiko Tevdorashvili, the administrator of Mereti, a village in Gori district, told Human Rights Watch that Russian aerial bombing of Mereti started on the morning of August 9. One woman, asleep in her home, died in the initial attack. As villagers started to assemble in one of the village neighborhoods in preparation for leaving, Russian aircraft again attacked, this time dropping five bombs in the neighborhood, instantly killing five people. Two later died of wounds sustained in the attack. Another witness stated that at least 10 civilians were wounded in the attack. One bomb completely destroyed two houses and seriously damaged several others.  
 
Tevdorashvili described the aftermath: “There were many wounded. I had to decide who had better chances of survival and stuff them into the ambulance. We buried the dead in the yards and fled the village.” Tevdorashvili said there was no Georgian military base in the village and no Georgian military forces present at the time of the attack.  
 
On August 11, Nunu Chlaidze, a schoolteacher, fled with her husband from Pkhvenesi village after Russian forces attacked military targets in and around the village earlier that day, causing collateral damage to civilian homes. She fled with her husband and neighbors, but turned back after seeing television news reports that civilians in the Gori district were not being attacked. But as they approached a Russian military roadblock near the village of Sakasheti, their car came under fire. She believes her husband was shot and lost control of the car, which then hit a Russian tank. Chlaidze was shot twice in the back, and Russian soldiers took her to a field hospital where she was treated. She ran away from the hospital. She has no information about the fate of her husband.  
 
Attacks by Georgian forces in South Ossetia  
 
Human Rights Watch continues to document Georgian forces’ use of indiscriminate force during their assault on Tskhinvali and neighboring villages on August 7-8, causing numerous civilian casualties and extensive destruction.  
 
“Any comprehensive investigation takes time, but we continue to gather information that points to indiscriminate attacks by Georgia’s forces,” Denber said.  
 
Human Rights Watch interviews with more than 100 people in Tskhinvali and in the villages of Nizhni Gudjaver and Khetagurovo yielded a clearer picture of Georgian forces’ indiscriminate use of Grad multiple rocket launchers and tank fire. In Tskhinvali, Human Rights Watch saw numerous severely damaged civilian objects, including a hospital, apartment buildings, houses, schools, kindergartens, shops, administrative buildings, and the university (http://www.hrw.org/english/docs/2008/08/12/georgi19594.htm).  
 
Georgian forces started shelling close to midnight on August 7, and continued uninterrupted through the night. The hardest hit areas of Tskhinvali were the city’s south, southeast, and central parts. When the first shells hit, many residents, including women, children and the elderly, rushed to their basements for shelter. They spent two days in their basements, emerging only on August 10, when the Russian military took full control of the city. Some were so frightened that they stayed in their basements until August 13.  
 
The shelling of Tskhinvali caused civilian casualties. For example, a Grad rocket hit the home of Anisim Jagaev, 74, on Kulaeva Street. His daughter told Human Rights Watch: “During the shelling, a Grad rocket hit the house, setting the roof on fire. [My father] went outside to try to put out the flames, and at that moment another rocket hit. He was wounded in his thigh by a piece [of shrapnel]. Our mother dragged him to the basement and spent several hours trying to stop the bleeding – but she had nothing to bandage the wound with. He slowly bled to death in her arms.”  
 
According to Tskhinvali residents, when the Georgian ground offensive started on the morning of August 8, Ossetian militias in some neighborhoods took up defensive positions inside civilian apartment buildings, which drew fire from Georgian forces. The militias were armed with automatic weapons.  
 
For example, local residents said that at around 3:30 p.m. on August 8, a Georgian tank opened fire at an apartment building on Tselinnikov Street, in the western part of Tskhinvali, after a group of Ossetian militias started withdrawing through the neighborhood. Six tank shells hit the building, destroying five apartments. Building residents told Human Rights Watch: “We all rushed to the basement, but an elderly man, some 80 years old, who lived on the fourth floor, didn’t manage to make it to the basement in time. His apartment was hit by a shell and caught fire. When the attack was over, we went upstairs and saw that the old man burned to ashes. We … buried [his] remains in the yard.”  
 
Neighborhood residents told Human Rights Watch that the attack did not result in any casualties among the militias, with whom they were all acquainted.  
 
Ossetian militias were a legitimate military target. However, international humanitarian law imposes a duty on all parties to avoid or minimize harm to civilians and damage to civilian objects. In particular, where feasible, a belligerent party should not endanger civilians by having military targets, such as combatants, present in or near densely populated areas.  
 
The Georgian military, however, were also obligated to take into account the risk to civilians of their attack, and not to conduct the attack if it was apparent that the civilian casualties would outweigh any likely military advantage they would gain.  
 
Also on August 8, according to villagers, at least four civilians died in Khetagurovo, a village of about 750 residents southwest of Tskhinvali, as a result of attacks by Georgian forces. Human Rights Watch researchers saw several houses in the village that were hit by multiple Grad rockets and shells from mortars. Villagers told Human Rights Watch that an elderly woman died in a fire caused by a Grad rocket that hit her house.  
 
After the shelling, Georgian infantry entered the village, spraying the gates and fences of homes with bullets, demanding that the militias surrender. According to witnesses, one of the stray bullets killed an elderly woman, Anastasia Jiueva, as she went to feed her chickens.  
 
Villagers claimed that at that point no militias were in the village, as they had left before the shelling and were hiding in the woods.  
 
At least some Georgian infantry were not aware that civilians remained in the village. One elderly man said that when infantrymen entered his yard, they were shocked to find him and his wife there. According to him, the serviceman said: “Have you been here the whole time, during the shelling and everything? We thought the civilians had all fled.” None of the 15 villagers interviewed by Human Rights Watch complained about cruel or degrading treatment by Georgian servicemen, who searched the houses looking for remaining militias and arms.  
 
Villagers remained concerned that there may be more casualties that they are not yet aware of. Madina, 30, told Human Rights Watch: “We are not sure who managed to flee and who died. The village is virtually deserted now. It will take time to find out the exact extent of the losses.”  

Georgia declares state of war with Russia

TBLISI, Georgia (CNN) — Georgia’s parliament Saturday approved a
request by President Mikhail Saakashvili’ s to impose a “state of war,”
as the conflict between Georgia and Russia escalated, Georgian
officials said.

Saakashvili accused Russia of launching an unprovoked full-scale
military attack against his country, including targeting civilian
homes, while Russian officials insist their troops were protecting
people from Georgia’s attacks on South Ossetia, a breakaway Georgian
region that borders Russia.

Russia’s Interfax news agency said the death toll was at least 2,000
killed in the capital of South Ossetia and claimed the city has been
destroyed.

Separatist-backed South Ossetian sources reported that about 1,600
people have died and 90 have been wounded in provincial capital
Tskhinvali since Russian forces entered the territory Thursday.

Georgia said the overall death toll would be closer to 100.

Georgian officials said Russia has mobilized its Black Sea fleet off
the coast of Abkhazia, another breakaway Georgian province.

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin arrived Saturday in Vladikavkaz,
near Russia’s border with Georgia, Russia’s Interfax reported.

Meanwhile, President George Bush, speaking from Beijing, called for an
immediate halt to the violence, a stand-down by all troops, and an end
to the Russian bombings. Video Watch Bush express concerns over
situation »

The Georgian “state of war” order is not a formal declaration of war,
and stops short of declaring martial law, according to Georgian
officials who described it to CNN.

It gives Saakashvili powers he would not ordinarily have, such as
issuing curfews, restricting the movement of people, or limiting
commercial activities, those officials said.

It places the government on a 24-hour alert, said Georgian National
Security Council Secretary Alexander Lomaia during a conference call
with reporters.

Saakashvili asked Western leaders to pressure Russia to agree to an
immediate cease-fire, which he said his country would willingly
observe first.

“We are dealing with absolutely criminal and crazy acts of
irresponsible and reckless decision makers, which is on the ground
producing dramatic and tragic consequences, ” Saakashvili said Saturday
afternoon.

A White House spokesman said President Bush spoke Saturday evening to
Saakashvili and Russian President Medvedev.

The war, Saakashvili said, “is not about South Ossetia. It has never
been in the first place. It is about destroying a small democratic
nation aspiring to live in peace, freedom and liberty.”

“This unprovoked, long-time-ago- planned invasion and aggression must
stop,” he said.

Russia, with a population of 146 million, is trying to destroy his
country of 4.6 million people, he said, comparing it to the 1979
Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.

“I think what is at stake here is the post-Cold War order,”
Saakashvili said.

Inna Gagloyeva, spokeswoman for the South Ossetian Information and
Press Committee, told Russia’s Interfax news agency that Tskhinvali
was being “massively shelled” with artillery guns. Video Watch images
of crashed Georgian war plane »

It was unclear which side was in control of that city on Saturday. The
Georgians said fighting raged, but the Russians said they had
“liberated” the city.

“Battalion task forces have fully liberated Tskhinvali of Georgian
armed forces and started pushing Georgian units out of the area of
responsibility of the peacekeeping forces,” said General Vladimir
Boldyrev, commander of the Russian Ground Forces, in an interview with
Interfax.

Colonel-General Anatoly Nogovitsyn, a spokesman for the Russian
Defense Ministry, told a news conference that the Russian paratroopers
will “implement the operation of enforcing peace” on both sides.

Nogovitsyn also confirmed that Georgians had shot down two Russian
aircraft. Saakashvili said his military has shot down 10 Russian bombers.

Russia said the troops were also reinforcing the Russian peacekeepers
already in South Ossetia.

“Our peacekeepers, along with reinforcement units, are currently
conducting an operation to force the Georgian side to accept peace,”
Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said at the Kremlin. “They are also
responsible for protecting the population.”

Interfax said 15 peacekeepers were killed in the Friday attack by
Georgian troops. Russia has opened a criminal probe into their deaths,
Interfax reported.

Georgia, a former Soviet Republic, is a pro-Western ally of the United
States intent on asserting its authority over South Ossetia and
Abkhazia. which both have strong Russian-backed separatist
movements.Video Watch Georgian minister describe fighting in South
Ossetia »

Russia moved troops into South Ossetia early Friday after Georgia
launched an operation in the breakaway region when its unilateral
cease-fire was met with what it said was artillery fire from
separatists that killed 10 people, including peacekeepers and civilians.

Russia charged that Georgia had targeted its peacekeepers stationed in
the region.

Medvedev said Saturday that Georgia must be held responsible for the
situation in South Ossetia.

“The people responsible for this humanitarian disaster need to be held
liable for what they have done,” Medvedev said. He said the
humanitarian problems were caused by “the aggression launched by the
Georgian side against the South Ossetian civilians and Russian
peacekeepers. ”

Russian officials said more than 30,000 refugees have left South
Ossetia and crossed into Russia over the past two days, since fighting
began, Interfax reported.

Maia Kardava, a Red Cross spokeswoman in the Georgian capital of
Tbilisi was unable to provide refugee or casualty figures Saturday
morning because she said aid workers were still gathering information
and visiting hospitals in South Ossetia and western Georgia.

Russian forces bombed several targets in Georgia on Saturday,
according to Kardava and the British Foreign Office, which advised
against all nonessential travel to Georgia.

Russian aircraft bombarded military and civilian targets the port town
of Poti, on Georgia’s Black Sea coast, Kardava and British and
Georgian officials said. Eight Georgians were killed in the port town,
Georgian officials said.

In the town of Senaki, just inland from Poti, Russian forces damaged a
railway line, a military base, and a center housing civilians who fled
from nearby Abkhazia.

Military bases at Vaziani and Marneuli also came under attack, the
British Foreign Office said, and Russian aircraft bombed the Georgian
town of Gori, about 35 miles northwest of Tbilisi, Georgian officials
said.

Inside South Ossetia, civilians have been without water, electricity,
and basic services for more than a day, Kardava said. She said the Red
Cross was unable to reach colleagues based in Tskhinvali because their
phones had lost power and they were huddled in bomb shelters.

Also Saturday, the commander of Georgian troops stationed in Iraq said
the 2,000 soldiers there will be withdrawn from Iraq “very soon.”
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Colonel Bondo Maisuradze said the United States would provide the
transport to get them out of Iraq. He said he had no time frame for
the move.

Saakashvili told CNN Friday that the troops were needed in Georgia to
defend against the Russian military.