Source: United Nations (video statements)
Joint press encounter by the E5 with statement read by Ms. Ondina Blokar Drobič, Deputy Permanent Representative of Slovenia to the United Nations, on the situation in Georgia – Security Council Media Stakeout.
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“The Russian invasion of Georgia in August of 2008 demonstrated the start of Russia’s more aggressive stance towards its neighbors. Russia has continued down this path with its unprovoked and unjustified aggression against Ukraine,” Slovenia’s Deputy Permanent Representative, Ondina Blokar Drobič, said Monday on behalf of European members of the Security Council.
Marking 17 years since the conflict, she told reporters in New York that Russia maintains an “illegal military presence” in Georgia’s Abkhazia and Tskhinvali/South Ossetia regions.
Drobič added that Moscow had taken steps “towards annexation of the two Georgian regions, including signing of the so-called integration treaties, transferring strategically important parts of Georgian territory and infrastructure to Russia and conducting illegal so-called elections.”
The ambassador also condemned the killings of Georgian citizens Davit Basharuli, Giga Otkhozoria, Archil Tatunashvili, Tamaz Ginturi, Temur (Vitali) Karbaia, and Irakli Kvaratskhelia, saying perpetrators must be brought to justice. She recalled judgments of the European Court of Human Rights that she said confirmed Russia’s responsibility for “grave human rights violations, including killing of civilians, torture, inhumane and degrading treatment.”
Responding, Russia’s Permanent Representative to the UN, Dmitry Polyanskiy, pointed to economic and people-to-people ties.
“Our trade turnover with Georgia is $2.5 billion – we’re the second trade partner of Georgia. We also had 1.5 million Russian tourists who visited Georgia last year,” he said, calling it evidence of a “clear desire of both our nations to re-establish mutual ties and to normalize our relations.”
Polyanskiy said some states sought to make Georgia “a pawn of their geopolitical interests,” and added that Moscow supported “the creation of a favorable security climate in the South Caucasus,” including treaties on non-aggression among Georgia, Abkhazia and South Ossetia.