US Congressman Kinzinger on Lukashenko: int’l community must confirm Tskhinvali, Abkhazia are Georgia

The US Republican Congressman Adam Kinzinger has reacted to the recent visit of the President of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, to Georgia’s Russian-occupied Abkhazia region and said that this move was against internationally recognized norms.

“True, it is not surprising that the despot from Belarus does everything as he is dictated from Moscow. However, the international community should make it very clear that Tskhinvali and Abkhazia were and always be the territory of Georgia,” the congressman told Voice of America.

In a written comment to the publication, Kinzinger stated that Lukashenko’s visit to Abkhazia was also related to the Kremlin’s failures in Ukraine, and noted that on the backdrop of the aggravated danger in the region, “Georgia should act especially carefully”.

“Now that Putin’s campaign in Ukraine is weakening, Georgians should be wary of any potential move by the Kremlin. Georgia is very well aware of all the threats that the Kremlin poses to its sovereignty, and the Georgian people should not be misled by false narratives spread by anti-Western voices,” he said. 

Lukashenko paid his first visit to the Abkhazia region earlier this week, with Tbilisi and international actors condemning the move, urging Belarus not to take a “wrong step” to the recognition of Georgian Abkhazia and Tskhinvali regions as independent states. 

Russia recognized the Georgian regions as independent states after the Russia-Georgia 2008 war. Since then only Venezuela, Nicaragua, Nauru and Syria have joined the illegal move widely condemned by the international community.