SUKHUMI. Jan 9 (Interfax-AVN) - The Armed Forces of the self- proclaimed Abkhazian republic will instantly take over positions of Russian peacekeepers in the Georgian-Abkhazian conflict zone if a decision is made to withdraw the peacekeeping force, Abkhazian First Deputy Defense Minister Givi Argba told reporters on Wednesday.
Argba was speaking about the positions along the Inguri River that divides Abkhazia from the rest of Georgia.
The Abkhazian leadership relies on the balanced approach of Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze to extension of the mandate of the CIS collective peacekeeping forces in the conflict zone, Agrba said. "Tbilisi should take into account that military confrontation may start again in Abkhazia, and that the withdrawal of Russian peacekeepers is a 95 percent guarantee of a new war," he stressed.
Earlier it was reported that the Georgian parliament would discuss extension of the mandate of the CIS collective peacekeeping forces in the conflict zone this week. The current mandate of the forces operating on the territory since summer 1994 expired on December 31 last year.
Lawmaker Irakly Batiashvili who headed the Georgian information and intelligence service before being elected to the parliament, said a regulation on the withdrawal of the peacekeepers was passed by the national legislature yet in October last year, and was is up to Shevardnadze to make the final decision. "The majority of lawmakers believe that there are no arguments left in support of the mandate's extension," Batiashvili said.