OREANDA-NEWS. October 10, 2008. The Russian side towards the end of the day on October 8 completed the pullback of its peacekeeping forces from the security zones abutting South Ossetia and Abkhazia ahead of time in accordance with the agreements reached between Russian President Medvedev and EU and French President Nicolas Sarkozy on September 8.

The handover of responsibility by Russian peacekeepers to the observers of the European Union Monitoring Mission (EUMM) in Georgia in those zones proceeded in a well-organized manner, despite the provocations and terrorist acts directed at scuttling these processes. Thus, control of security in the areas adjacent to South Ossetia and Abkhazia has since October 9 passed fully to the EUMM, acting on the basis of a mandate from the European Union. We expect UN and OSCE observers to join these efforts, too.

It is extremely important that after the pullback of the Russian peacekeeping contingent a security vacuum should not form in this region. We see the observers’ chief task in preventing recurrence of the use of force by Georgia and presume that their main efforts will be concentrated on control over the stationing of Georgian troops at their places of permanent deployment, along with work to prevent new military bases from being created in areas which are not the places of permanent deployment (including setting up strong points in the security zones) and not to allow the stationing in these areas of Georgian armed forces and interior ministry special forces and paramilitary units. Monitoring refugee returns and the targeted use of humanitarian aid is another part of their job.

Taking into account the complicated criminogenic situation on the Georgian territory which is part of the observers’ zone of responsibility, we expect that maintaining law and order and suppressing any provocations and incidents there will also be their task.

We presume that having assumed the functions of a guarantor of the nonuse of force by Georgia, the European Union and its monitoring mission will take necessary measures for the effective fulfillment of the entire set of related tasks.