Vice Speaker Tsulukiani links 2019 Chorchana checkpoint decision to renewed territorial losses

Georgia’s Vice Speaker and head of a parliamentary investigative commission, Thea Tsulukiani, has claimed that the country’s territorial integrity was further undermined in 2019 as a result of a decision by then-interior minister Giorgi Gakharia to “unilaterally establish” a police checkpoint in the village of Chorchana, near the Russian-controlled Tskhinvali (South Ossetia) region.

Presenting the commission’s findings to parliament on Tuesday, Tsulukiani claimed the move raised “legitimate questions” over whether there had been an attempt to artificially ignite tensions similar to those that led to the 2008 war with Russia. She questioned the role not only of Gakharia, who now chairs the For Georgia opposition, but also of Kakhaber Kemoklidze, then head of the National Security Council apparatus and formerly a senior official at the State Security Service.

Tsulukiani also pointed to the activities of activist Davit Katsarava and his group Strength in Unity, saying their presence in sensitive areas such as Chorchana, Atotsi and Abano had been linked to provocations and clashes with local residents.

In addition, the Vice Speaker criticised opposition politicians, including members of the United National Movement and the Christian Democrats, for backing a 2008 Council of Europe resolution that referred to the “bombing of Tskhinvali” and, she argued, wrongly suggested Georgian forces may have committed war crimes.