South Caucasus

Speaking at the end of a youth and sports festival the Armenian President said that "A democratic Azerbaijan is definitely preferable to us as a neighbour, and especially as a partner in talks,"

The Russian President arrived in Baku on Tuesday at the head of a powerful delegation and held discussions with President Aliev and other Azerbaijani officials.

"We are ready for direct dialogue with our Abkhazian and Ossetian brothers. I am convinced we will find common language to build common relations in the future." said the Georgian PM

The EU Monitoring Mission in Georgia has helped stabilise the situation after the bloody August 2008 War. However the situation on the frontline is often tense, and the future far from certain. Commonspace.eu Joseph d'Urso travelled with an EUMM patrol, and talked to villagers and IDPs whose life has been deeply affected by the war.

Prime Minister Dimitri Medvedev on Sunday told the Russian international broadcaster RT that the future needs to be determined by the people of georgia, Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

In this op-ed Dennis Sammut reflects on lessons to be learnt from how the conflict over South Ossetia spiralled into a short but bitter war between Georgia and Russia in 2008.

In this exclusive interview with commonspace.eu South Ossetia's envoy to Moscow blames Georgia for starting the 2008 war, and the international community for complacency bordering on complicity. He dismisses the role of civil society in resolution of the conflict and says Russia was the salvation of the Ossetian people.

Five years have passed since Georgia and Russia fought a short but costly war that again brought suffering and death on a huge scale to the Caucasus. Lessons need to be learnt and the world and the people of the region together must say "Never again", and must with their actions and their will avoid the spiral that leads to war. Commonspace.eu summarises the conflict and its background in ten short questions and answers as an introduction to a series of articles, interviews and special reports which we will be publishing over the next few days

A new fence around South Ossetia is both geographically and politically artificial, and creates problems for the local population.