Your editorial (26 February) states that “the Kremlin’s war over Georgia’s separatist region of South Ossetia” used “defence of Russian minorities as a pretext to negate the sovereignty and the integrity of an independent state”.Not so. The Russian military came to the help of South Ossetia, a small and otherwise defenceless nation (that never wanted to be part of post-Soviet Georgia) when its capital was bombarded by Georgia in a surprise nocturnal attack. “Russian minorities” didn’t come into it, nor was this any sort of “pretext”.Robin Milner-GullandProfessor emeritus, University of Sussex• This year marks the 40th anniversary of the signature …read more
Source: The Guardian
