Families receive remains of 23 missing from 1992-1993 armed conflict in Georgia
The families had the opportunity to receive information about the search and recovery of the remains and identification of their relatives. Photo: ICRC Georgia
Tweet 
Share
The remains of 23 individuals who had been missing since the 1992-1993 armed conflict in Georgia’s now Russian-occupied Abkhazia region were handed over to their families on Wednesday, in the latest stage of the process involving the Government and the International Committee of the Red Cross.
The families had the opportunity to receive information about the search and recovery of the remains and identification of their relatives during the meetings at the Tbilisi-based National Forensics Bureau that also involved Thea Akhvlediani, the State Minister for Reconciliation and Civil Equality, representatives of the Bureau and the Red Cross, the ICRC said.
Extending her condolences to the families, Anne Montavon, the head of the ICRC delegation in Georgia, stressed the Georgian authorities had “significantly stepped up” their involvement in the support of families through organising commemoration and “other events” this year.
She pledged the process of transition, “by which Georgian authorities take increased responsibility over the search of missing people, forensic work and in providing support to the families of the missing”, would continue next year.
Families need to be closely associated with these processes to ensure their views are taken into account and to inform future decisions”, Montavon said.
The remains of more than 55 people missing since the conflict have been identified and returned to their families this year as part of the humanitarian Coordination Mechanism on Persons Unaccounted For in Connection with the Events of the 1992–1993 Armed Conflict and After.
The Mechanism involves Abkhaz and Georgian participants and operates with the ICRC's support since 2010.
Since the inception of the platform, the remains of 273 people - recovered from different locations in Abkhazia - have been identified and handed over to their families, the ICRC said, adding 1,870 people, including combatants and civilians, were still missing.
Twenty-eight years have passed since the armed conflict in Georgia’s Russia-occupied region of Abkhazia. The Abkhaz war lasted 13 months and 13 days and ended with the loss of the capital of Abkhazia, Sokhumi, on September 27, 1993, which was preceded by negotiations between Georgia and Abkhazia with the mediation of Russia. On July 27, 1993 the Sochi agreement was signed but Abkhaz forces violated the terms and opened fire while Georgian troops were withdrawing from the region.
Monuments of Zhiuli Shartava and Guram Gabeskiria, former officials who were killed by Abkhaz separatist groups in 1993, will be placed in Tbilisi, Tbilisi Mayor Kakha Kaladze has stated earlier today.
Georgia’s Prime Minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili has appealed to anyone having information on people who went missing due to the 1992-1993 war in Abkhazia region and 2008
Russia-Georgia war to inform the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC).
It's been 21 years since the Babushera tragedy in Abkhazia and the bodies of thirteen Georgians who died in the crash are finally being returned home. A plane carrying more than 120 people from Tbilisi was shot down while landing at Babushera Airport in Sokhumi on September 20, 1993, during the Abkhaz war.
Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili and Government members on Thursday paid tribute to 23 victims of the 1990s armed conflict in the now Russian-occupied Abkhazia region after their remains were transferred to Tbilisi on Wednesday.
The Georgian State Ministry for Reconciliation and Civic Equality on Friday said a meeting involving Georgian and Abkhaz participants for finding and determining the fate of missing individuals from the 1992-1993 armed conflict in Georgia’s Russian-occupied Abkhazia region was hosted in İstanbul.
Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze on Saturday said Guram Gabiskiria, the former official who had been killed by Abkhaz separatist groups in 1993 during the armed conflict in Abkhazia, was an “immortal example of devotion to the motherland, persistence and fighting spirit”.