Georgian rebel regions eye union with Russia: report

MOSCOW: The breakaway Georgian regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia could join the Moscow-led Russia-Belarus union, a Russian newspaper reported Tuesday, citing the union's spokesman.

"If we receive an official application from Abkhazia and South Ossetia about entering the Union government, naturally we will look into it," Ivan Makushok, a spokesman for the Union of Russia and Belarus, told Nezavisimaya Gazeta.

The Union of Russia and Belarus was created in 1997 with the stated goal of reunifying the former Soviet republics of Russia and Belarus, but its progress has been slow and the union is now viewed as largely symbolic.

Representatives of Abkhazia and South Ossetia told the newspaper that they were interested in applying for membership of the union, a move that would likely anger the Georgian government.

However, in order for the two regions to join, Georgia would first have to recognize the sovereignty of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Makushok told the daily newspaper.

Georgia refuses to recognize the independence of the regions, which broke away from Tbilisi after a pair of separatist conflicts in the early 1990s and are tacitly supported by Moscow.

"The South Ossetian authorities have indeed formed a plan to join the union state," said Irina Gagloyeva, a spokeswoman for the separatist authorities in South Ossetia, the paper reported.

"Such integration processes do interest us," the newspaper quoted Sergei Shamba, the foreign minister of Abkhazia's self-styled government, as saying.

He said, however, that Abkhazia had taken no official steps toward membership.