De facto Abkhazia refuses entry for co-chairs of Geneva international discussions

Georgia’s Russian-occupied Abkhazia authorities will not receive the co-chairs of Geneva  International discussions on conflict issues, local media has cited the de facto foreign minister Inal Ardzinba as saying. 

The de facto official claimed the decision was related to the postponement of the 57th round of the discussions that was  planned on February 21-22. 

“Recently, this is not the first time when the co-chairs, without any objective reasons and without agreement with the participants in the negotiation process, make unilateral decisions to cancel or postpone the round. Only one of the four meetings planned for 2022 took place. We see a similar picture at the beginning of this year, when the co-chairs unilaterally decide to postpone the next round”, he said. 

He stressed such actions of the co-chairs were “ biased”, and hindered the work of the format. 

Before that, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov criticized the Western representatives participating in the Geneva discussions. He said the European Union, the United Nations, the OSCE and the United States were “trying to make this format of dialogue hostage to the ongoing events around Ukraine.”

In 2022, the Russian Foreign Ministry stated that the “Geneva discussions have become hostage to geopolitics” and indicated the need to conduct the talks “in a more neutral place”.