Besides democratization, and all that it implies, the government of Georgia must deal with separatist governments in Abkhazia and South Ossetia. While the former will likely prove much more difficult in general, Saakashvili’s governmet has just released a comprehensive plan to reconcile with South Ossetia. Most striking about the plan is how it deals two-fold with at once the Ossetian people outside the autonomous region and again with the government there.

As the article notes, “Georgia becomes the first country in the region to offer repatriation, restitution, and compensation to refugees in the context of conflict-settlement efforts.” Every effort is being made to heal the past 15 years so that incentives for rejoining the union are more wholeheartedly considered. These incentives are large and tempting.

As regards South Ossetia itself, the Georgian government proposes to take immediate steps toward: restoring the railway, bus, and taxi connections from Georgia’s interior to Tskhinvali; pay pensions to the region’s residents retroactively from 1991; resume deliveries of humanitarian aid; and launch a small- and medium-size enterprise development support program (co-financing, loans and loan-guarantees, interest-subsidization) designed to generate jobs and reduce the recruiting pool of armed criminal groups. Again, Georgia will provide some funding, but international donors such as the European Union and United Nations programs will be asked to contribute more than Georgia possibly could.

On the political side, ahead of negotiations on South Ossetia’s status, Tbilisi proposes: official status for the Ossetian language, in parallel with the Georgian language; dual citizenship, Georgian and Russian, for those Ossetians who have taken up Russian citizenship; formation of a joint commission to investigate crimes committed on either side during the armed conflict and in its aftermath; guaranteed representation of South Ossetians in Georgia’s parliament and in government departments; a quota of 50 places annually for Ossetians in the newly-created Zurab Zhvania School of Public Administration (which prepares members of ethnic minorities for careers in Georgia’s civil service); air time on national television and radio for South Ossetian authorities and for Ossetian cultural programs; assistance for the creation of non-governmental organizations, and consultations with these, once created; and working out inserts on Ossetian history in school textbooks on Georgian history, and vice-versa.

Russia is trying to stall efforts made in South Ossetia and Abkhazia, so it will be trying its best to disrupt in any way peaceful negotiations. This plan will hopefully draw the Ossetians away from any deal that Russia may try to woo them with. It is certainly in Russia’s interest to provoke instability as it gives them further control over the situation.

Perhaps the most important part of this deal, and anything that comes out of it, is that Saakashvili “absolutely ruled out secession as long as Georgia exists and has a government,” but made sure to note that there would be absolutely not military solution to the problem. This is in stark contrast to Russia’s “solution” for Chechnya, which has been, in effect, “repression which has led to extremism which has led to more repression.” Chechnya was not always the way it is now, but it was a separatist region that was dealt with in a brutal way. Saakashvili’s plan to amend for the past and tie Ossetia back into Georgia takes an alternative route that is both peaceful and self-determinate; that is, Georgia wants South Ossetia back, and South Ossetia may well determine that they want to go back..