https://www.russia-italia.com/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=4107&p=6574470#p6574470
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Caravaggio
04 Ottobre 2006, 11:25

Re: TENSIONE TRA RUSSIA E GEORGIA
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E intanto i russi alzano il tiro.... stanno imparando a 'negoziare' non c'è che dire...


http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2006/10/04/001.html

Wednesday, October  4, 2006

Georgian Transit, Postal Ties Cut By Anna Smolchenko and Nabi Abdullaev
       Staff Writers

          Russia shut down all transportation routes and postal service to
Georgia on Tuesday despite Tbilisi's decision to return Russian
officers arrested on suspicion of espionage.

The move to suspend railway, marine and air travel and mail delivery
from Russia to Georgia is expected to cost the Georgian economy
hundreds of millions of dollars.

Georgian officials downplayed the measures, with Economic Development
Minister Irakly Chogovadze saying sanctions were hardly new and
calling them "negligible." Kakha Bendukidze, the minister for reforms,
said that Georgia's gross domestic product would take no more than a
1.5 percent hit.

But according to a report Tuesday in Izvestia, Russian sanctions have
already cost Georgia about $200 million and will siphon an additional
$2 million from the country each day.

Standard and Poor's said Tuesday that souring relations between Russia
and Georgia could tamp down Georgian economic growth. The economy had
been predicted to grow by 6.2 percent in 2006 prior to the sanctions.

As Georgia's largest trading partner, Russia was the source of 16.6
percent of all of Georgia's imports in the first half of this year.
What's more, 11.2 percent of Georgian exports go to its neighbor to
the north, Standard and Poor's said.

Last year, wire transfers from Russia to Georgia amounted to $253
million and accounted for 63 percent of the total amount of wire
transfers to Georgia, Interfax said, citing data from Georgia's
central bank.

And the money earned by Georgians working in Russia is estimated to
account for about 4.7 percent of Georgia's GDP, Standard and Poor's
said.

Chogovadze seemed unfazed by the figures. "Georgia has gradually
accustomed itself to all sorts of embargoes," the minister said by
phone from Tbilisi. "We've sold almost nothing [to Russia] for the
past four months." Trade between the two countries would total no more
than $50 million from January through October of this year, he said.
Putting that figure into perspective, the Georgian government's budget
is $2 billion, he added.

Chogovadze noted that Georgia had already withstood a barrage of
Russian attacks -- the ban on farm goods, wine and mineral water; the
move to cut gas and electricity to the country for two weeks in
January; and, in September, the clampdown on road traffic.

"This will have absolutely no effect either on our politics or
economics," Chogovadze said. Unfortunately, he said, "it will be
ordinary people who will be hurt, both Georgians and Russians."

But Bendukidze said Russia could exert influence by hiking gas prices
and harassing Georgians living in Russia. Still, he said, a price
increase would cost the country no more than 0.7 percent of its GDP,
given that Georgian firms had diversified their energy supplies.

"Thank God we can now also buy gas from Azerbaijan and Iran," he said
in an interview.

Bendukidze also voiced confidence that Georgia would work around the
ban on transportation flows. Russia accounts for about 1.5 percent of
Georgia's railway traffic, he said.

Bendukidze said his wife was stuck in Moscow and looking for a way to
reach Georgia via a third country. He called the pretense used by
Russia to justify cutting ties with Georgia "nonsense." Moscow accuses
Tbilisi of not paying for Russia's servicing of Georgian airplanes and
of lackluster security.

Chogovadze acknowledged that the transportation ban had hurt Georgian
airlines. "An overnight cancellation of all flights certainly damaged
the airlines," he said. "There are international norms. They have been
rudely flouted."

As relations between the two countries have worsened, travel from
Russia to Georgia has begun to taper off. Georgy Aliashvili, director
of Georgian Discovery Tour, a Tbilisi travel agency, said the decline
in Russian business was not serious. He said the firm is focusing on
travelers from Europe and elsewhere, adding that just 251 of his
clients came from Russia last year.

Irina Danenberg, a spokeswoman for state-owned Aeroflot, said the
travel ban would certainly cost the airline money but that it was
premature to make any estimates.

Danenberg and a spokeswoman for privately owned Sibir Airlines, which
runs flights between Moscow and Tbilisi, said it was unclear when the
travel ban would end.

Russia officials, meanwhile, have escalated the war of words.

"The latest escapade with the seizure of our officers took place right
after NATO's decision to expand cooperation with Georgia and,
incidentally, just after [Georgian President] Mikheil Saakashvili's
Washington visit," Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Tuesday.

State Duma Speaker Boris Gryzlov said the Duma would consider a
resolution Wednesday denouncing Tbilisi and backing Russia's
retaliatory measures.

The Duma could also approve on Wednesday a bill being pushed by
Gryzlov that would end money transfers to Georgia. If it does, the
Federation Council will consider it Friday, Senator Igor Pushkaryov
said, Interfax reported.

The money-transfer measure would hit hundreds of thousands of families
of Georgian migrants who work in Russia and send money home.

U.S. and European Union officials are urging Russia to lift the
sanctions. Erkki Tuomioja, the foreign minister of Finland, which
currently presides over the EU, said Helsinki was ready to help
mediate between Moscow and Tbilisi. In Washington, U.S. Assistant
Secretary of State Dan Fried said the U.S. had offered to help resolve
the conflicts in the Georgian breakaway republics of Abkhazia and
South Ossetia.

Lavrov strongly opposes any third-party  involvement in the standoff.


