Kadyrov's idea of border crossing to Georgia reminds struggle for Pankisi

At the promotion of the Kremlin, Kadyrov is advocating the idea of building a road and a border crossing point from Chechnya to Georgia in order to ensure control by Russian intelligence services over the Pankisi Gorge, the political analysts interviewed by the "Caucasian Knot" have suggested.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that in December 2018, the Chechen television told about plans to build a border crossing point on Chechen-Georgian border.

Ramzan Kadyrov has repeatedly commented on the process of clarifying the borders of Chechnya with the neighbouring Russian regions, but his statements about the border crossing point with Georgia are caused not only by his interests, said Akhmed Gisaev, the head of the Human Rights Analysis Centre. "I don't think that he (Kadyrov) has himself decided to voice out the issue of arranging borders with another state. Russia's special services have long been showing interest in the Pankisi Gorge," Mr Gisaev told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

He believes that the initiative to build a road to Georgia and a border crossing point, voiced out by Kadyrov, is another phase of the long-standing struggle for the control over the Pankisi Gorge. Personally for Kadyrov, the arranging the border with Georgia is not of particular interest, the head of Chechnya in this case is pursuing the interests of the federal centre, Mr Gisaev believes.

"In this case, he is more likely the mouthpiece of Russia's highest political forces. I think that Russia's interest in Georgia has increased now; and the Kremlin will look for weak points in the policy pursued by [Georgia] to be able to manipulate," Akhmed Gisaev has concluded.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on February 10, 2019 at 01:22 pm MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.