Russia-Georgia Conflict: A Links Round-Up

Here's a map to get things started:

There are some jaw dropping photos available at the Washington Post's site.

For some fascinating history, I suggest reading this report (albeit from 2006), courtesty of the Inventory of Conflict & Environment at American University.

The report includes this map & key:


Is that depressing enough?

The report, authored by Rebecca Ratliff, notes the following:

There is more to the story than just territory and ethnic divisions ... The territory of South Ossetia, located in north central Georgia, holds two of the four major border crossings among the mountains separating Russia and Georgia and has several of Georgia’s important roadways running through it from east to west and north to south. Retaining control over such roadways and border crossings is important for Georgia as they aid both inter and intra-state movement of people and goods. In addition, two important oil pipelines, the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan and Baku-Supsa (see map), run through Georgia on their way to Black Sea ports. Separatist movements, such as the South Ossetian movement, pose security threats to the pipelines and the flow of energy sources. So not only is the environmental aspect important in terms of pollution and degradation, but also in geo-political strategic terms as well.

Some interesting environmental facts:

Unfortunately, many environmental challenges were also inherited by Georgia after the collapse of the Soviet Union, such as hazardous waste dumps, aging nuclear sites, etc. For example, there is an old Soviet “industrial complex” in northwest South Ossetia that is categorized as “still generating pollution” and a nuclear waste site in the south part of the territory, also leftover from the days of Soviet rule. Again, with the territory in conflict, these environmental hazards are not being properly secured, monitored, or cleaned up.

Amazing photo here.

And here.

The forest fire shots near Gori, Georgia are unbelievable.

Some video (you would never have a 5 1/2 minute story like this on American television ... our attention spans can't handle something like this so we wind up with CNN-style journalism):