Akhalkalaki, Samtskhe-Javakheti, Republic of Georgia © Onnik Krikorian / Oneworld Multimedia 2002

RFE/RL reports on trouble brewing in Georgia’s mainly Armenian populated region of Samtskhe-Javakheti. After local elections were held in Armenia’s northern neighbour last week, hundreds of ethnic Armenian Georgian citizens rallied in Akhalkalaki before eventually seizing a local government building.

The group called United Javakhk rallied hundreds of supporters in the regional town of Akhalkalaki and briefly seized a local government building on Monday, saying that they were robbed of victory in the polls held across Georgia last Thursday. Their official results showed the National Movement Party of President Mikhail Saakashvili winning the majority of votes in most parts of the country, including the Armenian-populated Javakheti. Observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation said the vote was “conducted with general respect for fundamental freedoms.”

The leaders of United Javakhk, who demand greater autonomy for Javakheti, ran for the Akhalkalaki district council on the ticket of Industry Will Save Georgia, a Tbilisi-based major opposition party. They claim to have won 70 percent of the vote.

Maksim Mahtesian, the ethnic Armenian chairman of the district election commission, denied the allegations on Tuesday, insisting that vote irregularities were not serious enough to affect the election outcome. “The situation here is calm now,” he told RFE/RL from Akhalkalaki.

Reports from other news agencies also stated that the protestors alledged that the elections were falsified and declared that a new “Rose Revolution” was taking place. The RFE/RL report, however, says that the rally has been condemned by other nationalist Armenian political forces that had previously sought autonomy in Javakheti.

In Yerevan, the head of the Javakhk Compatriots’ Union, Shirak Torosian, denounced the United Javakhk actions as “treason.” “We are calling on all forces in Javakheti to show prudence, put aside personal, factional interests and not serve third forces,” he told a news conference.

Torosian also urged Javakheti Armenian activists to drop their demands for the impoverished region to be given the status of an autonomy. The Georgian government and the international community associate the word “autonomy” with separatism these days, he said.

Well, I’m not so sure about having to drop demands for autonomy if there’s a genuine demand for it — unless the idea is going to be used to kickstart a small and unpopular separatist movement — but anyway. Although I still think that the idea of a Federal Georgia should be examined it’s interesting to see Armenians side with the Georgian Government on this one.

Indeed, even the most active of nationalist Armenian groups under Shevardnadze apepar to now be working with the Government.

Incidentally, another Akhalkalaki-based Armenian group demanding autonomy, Virk, reportedly teamed up with Saakashvili’s party to contest the polls and won several council seats. According to Mahtesian, 27 of the 32 newly elected members of the legislative council are ethnic Armenians.

Regardless, I’m glad that this hasn’t ignited even a minor internal conflict we could all do without. On the one hand, I do believe that ethnic Armenians, and Azerbaijani as well as other minorities in Georgia, should be given support in terms of maintaining their own culture, but on the other, there’s no doubt that they must also integrate into Georgian society.

In particular, they must learn the official language of Georgia, but they must also be afforded equal protection as citizens under the law. It’s also worth pointing out that much of the $295.3 million awarded to Georgia under the Millennium Challenges Account (MCA) is earmarked for Javakheti although I hope adequate mechanisms for oversight and transparency are in place.

Anyway, there’s no doubt in my mind that Russia is behind a lot of what’s going on in Javakheti, but I stress again that the Georgian Government must do everything to ensure that ethnic Armenians feel citizens of the Republic. Actually, I’d like to see the same for ethnic minorities in Armenia too. With the exception of Assyrians, most ethnic minorities are not regarded as citizens of Armenia by most of the population and that has to change too.

Nationality should equate to citizenship first of all, and not ethnicity.