MEMORANDUM
on Necessary Measures to be undertaken
in order to Ensure Security and Strengthening of Mutual Trust Between the Parties to the Georgian-Ossetian
Conflict.
Under the facilitation of representatives of the
Russian Federation and participation of representatives of the Republic of
North Ossetia–Alania and
Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), representatives of
the Georgian and South Ossetian delegations held
negotiations on further development of the process of comprehensive political
settlement of the Georgian-Ossetian conflict and,
Desiring to remove the consequences of the
conflict and restore the spirit of peace and mutual trust between the Parties
to the conflict;
Convinced of the necessity to put an end to the
tragic legacy of recent years and embark on the road leading to peace, trust
and accord;
Reiterating commitment to the UN Charter,
fundamental principles and decisions of the OSCE, and universally recognized
norms of international law;
Being guided by the principle of territorial
integrity of States and right to self-determination;
Stating with satisfaction that as a result of the
Agreement on Principles of Settlement of Georgian-Ossetian
Conflict and introduction of Combined Peace Keeping forces in 1992, hostilities
came to an end in the conflict zone;
Declaring our readiness to follow the path that
would lead to settlement of the conflict in the spirit of mutual trust and
exclusively by peaceful means;
Deem it necessary to take the following steps
aimed at comprehensive settlement of the conflict,
Agreed
upon the following:
1. The
Parties to the conflict shall denounce application of force or threat of
application force, as well as exerting political, economic or other forms of
pressure on each other.
2. The Parties shall undertake all necessary
measures aimed at prevention and cutting short any illegal actions that may
violate human rights on the ground of ethnic origin.
3. The Parties shall carry out real measures aimed
at comprehensive and dignified settlement of problems of refugees and
internally displaced persons that suffered as a result of the Georgian-Ossetian conflict.
4. The Parties shall agree that those individuals,
who have participated in the armed conflict but have not committed war crimes,
as well as crimes against the civil population, shall not be persecuted.
The Parties shall create, as soon as possible, all
necessary conditions for law enforcement bodies for carrying out inquiry and investigation
of the aforementioned crimes and bringing those responsible for the crimes to
justice.
5. The Parties are satisfied to declare that the
regular meeting between representatives of the law enforcement bodies of the
Parties is a very positive development and shall render comprehensive support
to them in order to improve the criminological situation in the conflict zone.
7. The Parties deem it expedient to work out,
within the framework of Mixed Control Commission, a plan of stage by stage
reduction of personnel and check points of the Combined Peace Keeping Forces,
concentrated in places of their permanent deployment, and organize their
services with due account of security needs of the local population.
8. The Parties express their readiness to organize
jointly, and with participation of International governmental and non
governmental organizations, meetings between Georgian and South Ossetian politicians, representatives of civil
organizations, and scientists with the participation of the Russian Federation
and other states, “round tables” of representatives of creative intelligentsia,
as well as meeting between journalists in order to exchange objective
information.
The Parties shall take all necessary measures
aimed at ensuring security of journalist working in the conflict zone.
9. The Parties shall continue negotiation process
aimed at comprehensive political settlement of the conflict.
10. The Parties are stating with satisfaction the
readiness of the
11. This Memorandum shall come into effect
immediately after it is signed.
On behalf of Georgia I. Menagarishvili
On behalf of
On behalf of the
On behalf of the
On behalf of the OSCE D. Boden
16 May
1996
(Newspaper “Svobodnaia Gruzia”, # 69, 17 May
1996)