Georgia has accused Russia of war crimes, human rights violations and a “rampage” across Georgian territory during the bitter military conflict between the countries almost 10 years ago.
In closing evidence before the European court of human rights in Strasbourg on Wednesday, the Georgian government said Moscow was guilty of multiple violations during the August 2008 fighting.
Over five days, it said, Russian planes carried out more than 100 attacks on Georgian targets. It said there was overwhelming proof that Russian bombs were dropped on civilian areas, killing and injuring innocent people. The evidence included witness statements, satellite footage, video, and phone intercepts.
The government in Tbilisi said Russian troops poured into Georgia’s two breakaway provinces of South Ossetia and Abkhazia when the conflict erupted. About 30,000 soldiers were deployed.
Moscow’s control of these territories was part of a plan “years in the making”, and the goal was to “occupy as much territory as it could get away with”, Ben Emmerson QC, acting for Georgia, told a panel of judges including a Georgian and a Russian representative.
Before and after a ceasefire, Russian ground troops entered ethnic Georgian villages, Emmerson said, sealing off entrances and exits. Ossetian forces and other irregular soldiers then systematically burned down Georgian homes and entire villages. They carried out summary executions and threatened individuals with death if they refused to leave, he said.
Georgia took its claim to Strasbourg the day after hostilities stopped. The long-running dispute – over what happened, and who was to blame for the war – reached its climax on Wednesday, when both Russia and Georgia delivered their final speeches.
Russia has complained repeatedly that the court is biased and politicised. It blames Georgia’s pro-western former leader Mikheil Saakashvili for starting the conflict, by sending soldiers to rebel-held South Ossetia, and says its role was merely one of honest peacekeeper.
