STATEMENT OF THE PARLIAMENT OF
of
In protest to the so-called parliamentary elections, organized by the
separatist authority of Abkhazia, a plebiscite - public referendum with voting
by refugee voters, people, forcibly moved from the Abkhazian Autonomous
Republic - took place November 23d, 1996, in Georgia and in a number of foreign
countries (the Russian Federation, Ukraine, Belarus, Armenia, Turkey, Israel,
Greece), in accordance with the legislation of Georgia and by decree of the
president of Georgia.
More than 223,000
voters, i.e. about 70% of the electorate who lived in Abkhazia before the
military conflict, participated in the plebiscite.
As might be
expected, the people questioned, amongst whom there were many Abkhazians, Russians,
Armenians, Greeks, Jews and representatives of other nationalities together
with Georgians, unanimously condemned the so-called parliamentary elections and
declared them illegal.
The plebiscite thus
confirmed the illegality of the elections conducted by the Abkhaz separatists,
as they were prepared ignoring the will of the real majority of refugee voters,
people that forcibly fled from Abkhazia under menace. The most of violation
turned out in Gali Region, where unprecedented falsification took place during
the election campaign.
The conducting of
the elections is the separatist regime's act of defiance to the international
community, and it would have been impossible for those elections to be hold
without the support of influential forces from
Fortunately this
time the attempt of separatist regime to mislead not only the Abkhazian
population, but also the world community, has failed.
The publicly
conducted plebiscite unveiled the separatist regime's unsuccessful attempt to
legalize results of ethnic cleansing by means of pseudo-elections.
The Parliament of
Georgia considers the conducting of the elections to be the separatist regime's
political suicide, as that authority, which not only lacks the confidence of
the majority of population but is also blamed in ethnic cleansing and acts of
genocide, is totally unable to gain recognition or the support of the world
community.
The Parliament of
Georgia wishes to express its satisfaction to leaderships of the UN, OSCE,
European Union, Europarliament, the CIS and other neighborly countries for
their negative position upon the illegal elections conducted by the
self-announced government of Abkhazia, and hopes that with direct assistance of
the commonwealth of nations the process of peaceful settlement of the conflict
in Abkhazia will be accelerated.
(Archive of the Parliament of