Russia is building a sophisticated radar and electronic survelliance station on a new military base in the breakaway Georgian territory of South Ossetia, according to a senior official in Georgia’s government.
Construction of the outpost near the town of Tskhinvali, capital of the enclave, has provoked Georgian warnings that Russia is actively preparing for a repeat of the 2008 August war that proved a disastrous humiliation for Western-backed democracy.
The strategic potential of the base, which would stand further south than any other Russian listening post, is much greater than has previously been suggested.
“Georgia is unfinished business for Russia,” the official said. “It is actively preparing for another moment to strike but to do so it needs all available tools. The plans for the radar station and communications interception at the base in Tskhinvali represent a new threat to our security. The threat is real when you have bases like this inside your borders.”
The equipment that Russia is bringing to South Ossetia would give it the ability to track air movements, as well as intercept mobile and other communications across the Caucuses and as far south as Iran.
South Ossetia, a tiny enclave just north of Tbilisi, declared independence last year after Russian troops crushed a Georgian effort to break Moscow’s hold on the territory just as the world’s attention was on the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympic Games.
The South Ossetian parliament recently voted to grant Russia a lease to build and operate a military base in Tskhinvali for 49 years. There are already more than 4,000 Russian troops in South Ossetia backed up by armed militias drawn from the 50,000 strong local population.
Abkhazia, another breakaway Georgian territory on the Black Sea, is believed to host a further 2,000 Russian troops.
Eka Tkeshelashvili, the head of Georgia’s National Security Council, said Russia was not paying the price of international condemnation for occupying Georgian territories.
“Russia is institutionalising its presence in Georgia by building bases in both the occupied territories,” she said. “This is a direct assault on Georgia’s territorial integrity - which is under occupation according to the terms of international law - and can only be reversed by a Russian withdrawal. Instead Russia is transplanting people and resources to territories that are both otherwise closed to the outside world.”
Relations between the enclave and Georgia have remained completely frozen since the war. Uniformed troops man sand-bagged checkpoints that sit with feet of the line of control on the main road between Tskhinvali and the Georgian town of Gori. Better known as the birthplace of Josef Stalin, Gori has been rebuilt after suffering damage in a brief occupation by Russian troops during the war.
The majority of the 28,000 ethnic Georgians driven out of South Ossetia during the fighting have been rehoused in rows of tiny square bungalows built outside Gori.
After suffering years of pro-Russian politicians being dealt reverses at the ballot box in its “near-abroad,” Moscow has celebrated the downfall of Western allies in Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan.
Georgian officials claim that Moscow has encouraged opposition candidates to lead mass demonstrations that lead to the overthrow of Mikheil Saakashvili, the Georgian leader.
Mr Saakashvili has infuriated the Kremlin since taking power in the 2003 Rose Revolution by pursuing close ties with America and Europe. Russian leaders have also sought to use close ties with the neighbouring Armenian dictatorship to provoke secessionist movements within the Armenian minority in Georgia.
“Russia is following a strategy of blowing up the castle from within,” said an official. “It wants to cause huge pressure on the government by financing the opposition and using its leverage within the neighbouring regions to bring chaos within Georgia.”
Opposition leaders however contend that it was the recklessly antagonistic policies followed by Mr Saakashvili that has endangered Georgia.
“Over the past six years the government has escalated bad relations with Russia to the maximum,” said Irakli Chikovani, leader of the opposition Free Democrats. “Rather than engagement with the best of Russia we have the occupation of the occupied territories. The war could have been avoided with a more diplomatic approach in August, 2008 - nothing justifies the occupation of Georgian territory.”
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