“Peace is where we are!” Russian Helicopters Dropping Leaflets in Samegrelo

Nana Pazhava, Zugdidi

Russian military helicopters are bombing Samegrelo with leaflets. The Russians dropped leaflets in village of Rukhi, Zugdidi District several days ago. Meanwhile, Russian armored vehicles, moving towards Enguri Central Bridge distributed leaflets among the local population. It was written in leaflets with blue fonts on white sheets of papers: “Inhabitants of Zugdidi District! Your safety is now in the hands of Russian peacekeepers!” The main motto of the peacekeepers was “We are at Peace”.

The inhabitants of Rukhi village saw that papers were dropped from a Russian military helicopter. The villagers became frightened. They only started picking up the leaflets when the helicopter disappeared. The eyewitnesses state that about 100 leaflets with slogans in Russian language were dropped from the helicopter. 

It was indicated in leaflets that Russian peacekeepers were in Zugdidi only temporarily in order to establish peace, to avoid the tragedy that had occurred in Tskhinvali and to protect houses of Georgians and not to permit the death of Georgian mothers, children, brothers and husbands.

“Georgia is going through a difficult phase. Saakashvili has destroyed more than what he had built. He can not control the situation in the country. The USA and President George Bush are trying to come out of crisis using Saakashvili as a pawn and the lives of Georgian soldiers is the price. That is why military servant panicked and started retreating to Tbilisi on August 11th. They left aggression, looted houses and carried out violations against their own people on their way back. Saakashvili knows it but he limits flow of true information to people. Georgian TV stations and web sites continue to spread false information and blocks the real information about what is going on. They are fooling you!” – A quote from the leaflet.

In the end, Russians reminded the inhabitants of Zugdidi that Russian peacekeepers are the real guarantors of peace and not actually occupants.

There were two emblems on leaflets: the Russian emblem on the left and the emblem of UN peacekeeping forces on the right.  

The civilians state that Russians decided to spread political leaflets after having contacted with Georgian population. An inhabitant of Rukhi village states that the only guarantors of peace in Georgia are Georgians. “Russians covered the whole Samegrelo like a swarm of locust. They opened so many check points that it is impossible to avoid them. There is no use of confronting with them. We can’t change anything. The only thing we can do is to bear them but for how long? Fear will get you everywhere. If you talk to a Russian solider in a rude way, he will point a gun at you…”

The Russian occupants have not left the most of Samegrelo region up to now. Apparently, they are not planning to leave anytime soon because they deployed additional number of soldiers to block posts and stretched protective wires around their block posts. Russians opened 9 illegal check points in a so called buffer zone is Samegrelo. Poti-Nabada, Khobi-Pirveli Maisi, Chkhorotsku-Kveda Chkhorotsku, Tsalenjikha- Kanti, Fotskho-Etseri, Muzhava, Fakhulani, Senaki-Teklati, Khaishi-Khudoni. The headquarters of Russian army is located in Urta. A large amount of equipment is kept there.