PROTOCOL ON INTERACTION OF LAW-ENFORCEMENT BODIES IN
THE ZONE OF THE GEORGIAN-OSSETIAN CONFLICT
Settlement of Java,
Current situation in the conflict
zone tends to further stabilization. Crimes and incidents that have occurred
this year have been mainly of political rather than criminal nature.
Efforts have continued to establish
interaction between law-enforcement agencies of the sides that together with
the Command of the Joint Peacekeeping Forces implement practical measures for normalizing
the situation in the conflict zone. The Working Group meeting on February 4 1997
recognized the need for staged transfer of JPKF functions to law-enforcement
bodies of the sides, under Articles 4 and 5 of the Memorandum On Measures for Building
and Strengthening Mutual Confidence between the Sides in the Georgian-Ossetian
Conflict, signed in Moscow on May 16 1996, Statement on the meeting between
E.A. Shevardnadze and L.A. Chibirov in Vladikavkaz on August 27 1996, and
paragraph 4 of JCC Decision of February 13 1997.
The sides agreed to:
1. provide for efficient legal and
personal protection from criminals for all people living or passing across the
conflict zone; improve coordination between law-enforcement bodies for
establishing order in the Georgian-Ossetian conflict area; exchange information
about plotted or committed crimes with further arrest of the criminals; conduct
coordinated measures for arresting organized criminal groups.
2. participate
in the development and implementation of target programs to combat crime, drug
trafficking, money counterfeiting and other kinds of crime; have permanent
stable contacts with operative duty officers of the sides for timely exchanging
information and taking necessary measures.
3. coordinate
investigation and search operations and other necessary actions for
investigating crimes committed in the Georgian-Ossetian conflict zone,
including those committed in previous years, and for instituting criminal
proceedings against all perpetrators, also for taking action to detect and
detain them.
4. showing their good will, both
sides to always consider and agree at an adequate level the issue of
transferring perpetrators of minor criminal offenses, together with their
investigatory information, for being prosecuted by the other side; exclude the
practice of illegal discharge of the transferred criminal offenders by the
sides, thus ruling out possible mutual distrust of the law-enforcement bodies;
create an integrated database of so-called ‘criminal underworld leaders’.
5. take
joint efforts to block all ways and opportunities for selling stolen cars; the
sides to commit to provide comprehensive and effective support to each other
for stolen property detection and return.
6. consider
transferring personal and retirement histories of police officers, also their
arms and vehicles to stakeholder sides;
7. provide for
the Road Police and other services in the Georgian-Ossetian conflict zone to
work in close cooperation with the JPKF Command; agree locations of the Road
Police posts in the conflict zone with the JPKF Command.
8. at least once in a month hold
regular consultations of heads of law-enforcement agencies for addressing
issues that pertain to implementation of provisions of this Resolution.
9. before
15 October 1997, remove three-sided JPKF observation posts, namely the posts of
Ergneti, Tamarasheni, and Kekhvi. Order maintenance function on this section
shall be transferred to the police of the sides in conflict. The JPKF Commander
shall make a decision as to how the free three-sided observers can be used, to
be then approved by the JCC. Law-enforcement bodies of the sides in conflict
shall be made responsible for prohibiting transportation of arms and
ammunition, explosives and toxic substances on the Kekhvi-Tskhinvali-Ergneti
section.
10. motorcades
of border guards of the
11. systematically
exchange information about illegally stored firearms; take measures for seizing
such arms and ammunition.
12. effectively
strengthen measures against drug use and drug trafficking; set up special
investigation groups to work in close contact for collecting and registering
information about drug dealers and drug users, also for blocking all drug
import and distribution channels. For this purpose, the sides shall provide
assistance for detecting drugs and vehicles.
13. This Resolution shall be used as
a basis for interaction between law-enforcement bodies of the sides; it shall
enter into force on the date of its approval by the JCC and shall be effective till
the time of final political statement of the Georgian-Ossetian conflict.
For the Russian side (signed)
For the Georgian side (signed)
For the North-Ossetian side (signed)
For the South-Ossetian side (signed)
(Archive of the OSCE Mission to