Interfax
August 8, 2013
Georgia had aggressive plans with respect to both S. Ossetia, Abkhazia in 2008 – Abkhaz President Ankvab
SUKHUMI: Georgia had aggressive plans with respect to both South Ossetia and Abkhazia in 2008, Abkhaz President Alexander Ankvab said while visiting the South Ossetian Embassy on Thursday to commemorate those who were killed in the August 2008 Russian-Georgian conflict over South Ossetia.
“We have proof of this, and following events confirmed this,” Ankvab said.
“By coming here, we pay tribute and show respect to those who offered staunch resistance to Georgian aggression in August 2008. These were hardest nights and days when the entire international community faced the question of whether the people of South Ossetia might cease to exist or not,” Ankvab said.
“We all see how the international community, which is even now trying to condemn the Russian Federation’s actions and our common actions at the time, is once again teaching us the lesson of double and triple standards, seeming not to understand what could have happened then,” he said.
“If the Russian political leadership had not reacted to what was happening in South Ossetia, then perhaps another horrible and gruesome page would have been added to the modern history of humankind. The Russian armed forces provided the courageous Ossetian people with timely and appropriate assistance,” he said.
Ankvab recalled how the international community, which “likes to point to the luxuries of life together with Georgia” to Abkhazia, pretended that “nothing was happening” in August 2008.
“We bow our heads to all of the relatives and loved ones of those killed. Abkhazia and South Ossetia supported each other during that hard time. We will continue to support each other and our states,” Ankvab said.
He thanked then President Dmitry Medvedev and current President Vladimir Putin for rendering timely help and support to the Ossetian and Abkhaz peoples in August 2008.
Ankvab also thanked all Russians who “responded to that calamity.”
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