| Publication |
2011.
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| Summary/Abstract |
THE RECOGNITION OF THE INDEPENDENCE OF Abkhaziya and South Ossetiya on 26
August 2008, following the five-day Russo-Georgian War (8-12 August), at a stroke
created a new dynamic in Russia's ethnic and federal relations and in the politics of the
Caucasus as a whole. Nation and state building aspirations were heightened across the
region. For the first time the independent political status of sub-national entities was
recognised in post-Soviet Eurasia, and this could come to threaten Russia itself. The
initial disintegration of Yugoslavia had occurred along the lines of the constituent
republics, but the recognition by the United States and some of its allies of Kosovo's
unilateral declaration of independence in February 2008 broke the unspoken taboo
against the recognition of sub-republican units that had governed processes of state
formation in the post-communist world (Pavkovic´ & Radan 2007, Chapter 5). The war
demonstrated that the process of the disintegration of the USSR was far from over,
but had only been 'frozen' for some two decades. Russia was now forced to deal with
Caucasian conflicts in a more fluid and broader international context, while
intensifying concerns about Russia's own territorial integrity. Although the threat
of outright separatism has waned, the adhesive bonds of the Caucasus with Russia
have also weakened (Malashenko 2009). The interconnectedness of the various
conflicts has now become evident (Cheterian 2008).
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