Home > The Magazine > Features

Wednesday 3 December 2008

Dare to dream and make your ultimate trip a reality

The latest culture as recommended by our staff

Michael Henderson

Michael Henderson suggests

Email registration

Free weekly email update

Great products and special offers for Spectator readers

Click here for great value events

Click here for exclusive articles, offers, tasting notes and discussion

Will we betray Georgia?

Susan Richards

Wednesday, 14th June 2006

Susan Richards says that the Russian ban on Georgian wine is a whisper of the tensions that could turn into a roar — a Great Game for the 21st century

Russia being in no position to respond militarily, it has responded shrewdly to the West’s moves. Staged agreements to dismantle its four military bases in Georgian territory have been met: two have been closed already, and things appear to be on track for withdrawal from the last two over the next couple of years. More significantly, Russia appears to be preparing to decamp from the naval base in Crimea in 2017, when its agreement with Ukraine lapses. For an ex-superpower like Russia, this is all profoundly humiliating.

Like the chess-playing country that she is, Russia has instead been playing to the strengths of her position. In Abkhazia, South Ossetia and southern Ukraine, whose minorities strongly object to being subsumed into nations where they feel unsafe, Russia has been consolidating her hold.

Meanwhile, she has started reminding her neighbours how conditional their ‘independence’ really is. In Georgia the year began with mysterious explosions on the main gas pipeline from Russia, which left the country without heat at the height of a fierce winter. Even before that Russia banned the import of fresh fruit and vegetables from Georgia. Following the embargo on wine imports, Russia has now banned another of Georgia’s big exports — mineral water from Borjomi and Nabeglavi.

This leaves Georgia in crisis. Most of its old industry has ground to a halt as a result of contested privatisation deals. Wine was Georgia’s second largest export, and 70 per cent of that was going to Russia. On top of all this the conflicts with Abkhazia and South Ossetia have left a quarter of a million Georgians internally displaced. If the country staggers on, it is thanks to a combination of US help and remittances from abroad, where a quarter of the population are working. There are now rumours that Russia may send home the two million Georgians working in Moscow. If that happened it would bring economic collapse.

Previous page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 Next page

More articles from: Susan Richards | this section

Print this article | Email to a friend | Permalink | Comment

Post this entry to: del.icio.us | Digg | Newsvine | NowPublic | Reddit

I will always defend a big spender like J.M. Keynes

Nancy Dell�Olio

Nancy Dell’Olio makes an impassioned case for Keynesian economics as the necessary remedy for the global crisis. It is to the Cambridge economist that we should turn once more

How I became Bulgaria’s etiquette guru

Dylan Jones

Dylan Jones is astonished to find in Sofia that the former communist country has embraced his guide to the mores of modern life — and that not everybody looks like Borat

Rudd has lurched from indecision to phoney war

Matthew Castray

Matthew Castray looks back on the Australian Prime Minister’s first year in office and audits an administration which has reviewed much and done very little

Incompetence is fine: but being offensive is sure to get you sacked

Rod Liddle

Rod Liddle says that something has gone wrong when 15 South Lanarkshire social workers are sacked over a dodgy Gary Glitter joke while none of their counterparts in Haringey has even been reprimanded over the ‘Baby P’ case

Brown has played into the hands of the Tory Bullingdon Boys he loathes

Fraser Nelson

Fraser Nelson says that the Pre-Budget Report killed off New Labour without landing a punch on the Tories. It has paved the way for a new Conservatism, in which Cameron woos aspirational voters, focuses on government debt and looks for responsible spending cuts