Mar 21, 2007

Abkhazia: Campaign for Reconciliation


A Georgian newspaper has published an apology for the war between the Abkhaz and Georgians in the 1990s which left upwards of 20,000 people dead.
Below is an article published by Alternative Start;

We, representatives of the Georgian Society, consider it is necessary to make this appeal and launch a campaign to bring back the trust between Georgian and Abkhazian people to life.

Today, when fifteen years have passed since the tragic war, it is easier to evaluate the events that resulted into the separation of the two peoples. It is high time to give proper names to everything that happened.

Several years ago, a part of the society tried to resist the escalation of the war. Series of arbitrary detentions resulted from the announcements against the provocative war. Public has not information about those detentions yet. Many of us were children at that time and the reasons that resulted into a war are still obscure for us. Time passes by, however the pain still remains in our hearts, the wounds are still bleeding. The questions are not answered yet. The future is still vague.

This appeal is coming directly out of our hearts. We wish to beg every Abkhaz person to forgive us.

Sorry for not having hindered the war.

Forgive us for not having been able to avoid the disaster that happened.

We can understand that a war has its causes and both parties had provocateurs and encourager, who was supplying the rival brothers with weapons to make them kill each other.

Somebody has more faults; the other has less; however everybody is guilty in the war.

The war innately means the defeat …

We wish to announce this appeal publicly:

Sorry

Let us not divide the people as “ours” and “theirs”; “enemies” or “fraternal people”; “Georgians” and “Abkhazians”. We are not enemies. We have nothing to war about. We wish to apology to every Abkhaz person because of Georgians launched the war. Georgian authority never expressed the will of Georgian population.

We are sorry about those people who were called Georgians but were shooting. We are sorry about each bullet that was shot, for every word that caused the war.

We believe that the sense of past malevolence should not separate the nations, just the opposite it should bring us together.

Today, we are launching the Campaign “Sorry” and we want to make everyone think about the reasons and results of the war. Let us think about the present day; let us seek the ways towards each other’s hearts. We start our campaign with apology and we wish to show to everyone that it is much easier to achieve results with tender heart than through war and violence. Gun blazing can never be approved.

We want to show to everyone how precious Abkhazian culture, Abkhazian people, Abkhazian language…are.

We want to hold out our hands. We are applying to every Abkhaz.

We know in advance that this appeal will cause the protest from many parties. We know that, unfortunately, Abkhazian and Georgian people’s friendship has many enemies. However, we can find the ways to each other’s hearts; we can restore the broken bridge between our nations.

Authorities are changing continually; however, Abkhazian and Georgian people never fade away. Our children must live in peace.

Sorry for not having got in touch with you for so long time; for not having announced these words publicly until now.

Sorry for not having been able to resist the disaster that happened.

Sorry for not having done more for you, though we could.

We are praying for you.
We are praying for Abkhazian and Georgian people.
We are praying for peace.
We are praying for reconciliation.