Saakashvili is an "unpredictable, pathological, and mentally unstable drug abuser," says Medvedev.

Mikheil Saakashvili is a coke addict with a bipolar disorder. This is what the Western MSM is keeping quiet about. It's a huge embarrassment to western leaders who are looking to the ex-Soviet Republic joining the military-political organisation, NATO.

During the recent Caucasus Conflict the BBC caught Saakashvili chewing his own tie in a moment of anxiety. Then, on being challenged on Saakashvili's use of the European Flag, France's President Sarkozy while looking visibly embarrassed replied that no one could be stopped from using the European Flag if they so wished.

Now Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has stated publicly that Saakashvili is an "unpredictable, pathological and mentally unstable drug abuser":

“The Georgian head of state is not just a man we won’t do business with. He’s an unpredictable pathological and mentally unstable drug abuser. Western journalists, that interviewed him not so long ago, know it! A two-hour-long interview on the high – that’s over the edge for a head of state. If NATO needs such a leader - go ahead.”

Russia Today, 13 September 2008

The RT article, "I'll never forget that night" has had its sub-headline changed from "Saakashvili is a mentally unstable drug abuser - Medvedev". According to a leading RT journalist, several RT personnel had been present when Medvedev made the latter comment in a closed discussion with members of the Valdai Discussion Club.

According to the same journalist, Saakashvili has got an insatiable taste for coke as well as expensive wrist-watches. "If you want a meeting with Saak it is understood that he expects a watch worth no less than $15k."

A further report on Medvedev's allegations are, in reference to his comments about Georgia's possible NATO membership, on the Civil Georgia website:

“As far as Georgia’s NATO membership is concerned, I have already told you about it, it will clearly be one of the serious destabilizing factors for NATO itself and for Caucasus. It would have been only a half-trouble if there were balanced, wise politicians in the Georgian leadership – even if they were oriented towards overseas [referring to western orientation]; but it is another matter when there is a person as a head of state, with whom we will not only have any business, but also who is totally unpredictable, a person burdened with a mass of pathologies, who, unfortunately, is in an unbalanced psychological condition, [a person] who – am sorry but – takes narcotic drugs, which is a well-known fact for western journalists, who have interviewed him recently. Two hours of interview under the condition of a strong narcotic influence for a head of state – it is too much, it is overdose. If our colleagues from NATO want to have this kind of leader, then go ahead.”

Civil Georgia, Tbilisi, 13/09/08

You can see a report by RT on the Valdai Discussion Club speech here. Reference to Medvedev's comments are made in the final part of the video report.

Another commentator on a private forum observes that:

Tbilisi is a place where people enjoy vast social networks even if they don't have Internet access. My friends from there seem to be well aware of Mikheil's drug addiction.

Sadly, this problem is very typical among the people of his generation in the former USSR. In his case it's probably stemming from addiction to medicine he had to take for his bipolar disorder.

It’s a shame that his handlers and political entourage keep exploiting this sick man. I hope that Mikheil will be brave to seek professional help soon.

'Untimely Thoughts' - An Expert Discussion Group on Russia, 12/09/08

This may not be breaking news in Russia or in the Caucasus but most certainly is to those of us in the West who have been subject to an incessant barrage of disinformation and downright lies about recent events in the Caucasus Conflict where these days our embedded MSM behaves as if it were under Soviet-style reporting restrictions.

The prospect of a mentally unstable, drug-addicted sociopath leading an unstable ex-Soviet Republic with aspirations to joining NATO should be giving our western rulers nightmares. The disturbing fact that while not only is it failing to have that effect, that it is, on the contrary, only encouraging them to up the ante, to rearm the belligerent Georgians and to cheer them on to fully-fledged NATO membership should lead us to ask if the West, led by the US, is deliberately setting-up Georgia once more as its proxy in a premeditated, future hot war with Russia?

There is plenty of reason to believe so. It is widely held that such a confrontation might be sparked off in the Ukraine where another unstable regime, currently led by the unpopular Viktor Yushchenko, is in a rulership crisis. Many Ukrainians are of Russian origin and most Ukrainians would prefer to ally with Russia and not NATO:

Ukrainian citizens prefer integration with Russia and other CIS member countries to that with European and Euro-Atlantic structures, judging by the results of a recent poll posted at the Thursday press conference at the Interfax-Ukraine office in Kyiv.

A recent poll held by the Ukrainian National Academy of Sciences' Sociology Institute polled 1,800 Ukrainians nationwide on August 15-27 by request of the Ukrainian Forum foundation.

Twenty-seven percent of the respondents said they wished full-scale political and economic integration with Russia and other CIS countries, while 26% suggested economic integration within the CIS trade zone. Only 17% wished the soonest EU membership, and another 23% supported more profound relations with the European Union and a free trade zone.

Forty-six percent said that the possible accession to NATO would cause Ukrainian destabilization, and about 30% said the opposite.

Interfax, 04/09/08

But, for geo-strategic reasons, the area is up for grabs by the West which has no intentions of Russia regaining its old hegemonic presence in the Crimea. Not only have Ukrainian politics been destabilised by western neocon organisations but the present, highly unpopular Yushchenko is a US puppet.

The problem facing Ukraine today is the President, Viktor Yushchenko.

What we are seeing, but has not been properly reported ... is an ongoing power struggle between the Office of The President and the people's democratically elected representative Parliament (Pure and simple).

Yushchenko and his political party Our Ukraine continuously seek to undermine Ukraine's economic and democratic development. They have opposed every effort to see Ukraine become at democratic parliamentary republic.

Ukraine Today, 09/09/08

A mentally ill drug abuser on the one hand and a would-be tyrant on the other. These are the West's 'allies' in an area of the world which is in any event a geo-strategic flashpoint. As most analysts agree, it is inconceivable that the Georgians would have unleashed their genocide on the small republic of South Ossetia without some encouragement from neocons in Washington DC who had already armed them to the teeth. And as has been suggested by a previous article published here at least one of the motives of the US might have been to test the resolve of the Russians, their allies and the European Union in the face of Russian retaliation. A test case, then, for the US war-machine against more serious conflicts it might have in mind to unleash in Eurasia.

One Russian strategic analyst proposes a possible false-flag incident which could lead to a much wider conflagration:

[A] provocation such as a murder of Russian sailors or a blow-up of a Russian warship will be organized in Sevastopol, the result being a civil war in Ukraine and a direct military conflict between the country and Russia.

Obviously, the US intends to use Georgia as a foothold in a campaign aimed at dragging Russia into a low-intensity conflict as it has been done in Vietnam. The response of the Ukrainian leadership has shown that it is ready to join Georgia in a military confrontation with Russia in case Washington asks it to.

Parallelly, the US will be bracing for an attack on Iran. The result will be McCain's victory in the coming presidential race. The American society has given him carte blanche to take drastic measures to deal with the countries which do not side with the US.

'Georgia: the First Step Towards Chaos Control (II)', Yuri Baranchik, Strategic Culture Foundation

Baranchik goes on to observe the disastrous failure of the unipolar US in exercising foreign policy and the highly dangerous time in which we find ourselves:

The fact that the US elite aims at instigating a series of regional conflicts shows that the US is no longer able to carry the burden of the global leadership, and the coming war is the last resort to retain it. However, the conflict will not last forever and sooner or later the US will have to downscale its military and political presence worldwide. The reliance on war demonstrates that the US elite's intellectual potential needed to maintain the status of the US as the only superpower is exhausted.

'Georgia: the First Step Towards Chaos Control (II)', Yuri Baranchik, Strategic Culture Foundation

Now that the US puppet and dictator, Musharraf, is no longer in control even Pakistan is now threatening to retaliate if the US continues to make cross-border attacks against its territory. While the US is now weak it becomes even more dangerous and liable to strike out at any one of the innumerable enemies it has created for itself world-over. When does threatening talk lead to something far worse?

Anticipating the likelihood of a serious political crisis in the Ukraine, the US talks tough:

U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Daniel Fried pledged Friday that the United States would back Ukraine in a territorial dispute ... Fried's remarks echo comments made last week by Vice President Dick Cheney. During a visit to the ex-Soviet Republic, Cheney said the U.S. has "a deep and abiding interest" in the country's "well-being and security."

Wiredispatch.com, 12/09/08

The great irony of this particular report is the contrast between the US' verbal machismo and the more cautious approach exercised by the Ukrainians themselves!

However, Ukraine's defense minister said during a visit to Denmark Friday that a war with Moscow was unlikely because Ukraine is such an important link in Europe's energy supply.

Asked about a potential military conflict with Russia, Yuri Yekhanurov said he didn't "believe something like this might happen in the future."

A conflict would "have an influence on not only Ukraine but the whole world," Yekhanurov said, noting that 80 percent of the natural gas exported to Europe passes through Ukraine.

ibid

For Europeans, the situation is crystal clear. The days of the all-powerful US are now finally gone. It is in the interests of Europe to find a stable entente with Russia as a partner and an ally. If outright EU membership for Russia is inconceivable than it should be given nothing less than a most favoured nation status. The US won't like such moves and will do everything to stop them from happening. All the more reason why the EU should now work more closely with Russia and China and, at the same time, stand firm against any further warmongering from the White House.

Rory Winter

Better Russia as an ally than a foe
Peter Sain Ley Berry
EU Observer, 04.09.2008

When I was at university, there used to be a game, still popular around the world today, called Diplomacy. The players each represented one of the major European nations as they existed about one hundred years ago: France, Britain, Germany, Italy, Russia and so forth; their mythical armies and fleets (no aeroplanes then) battled for territory and power on a large board representing the map of Europe and the seas around it.

The game was known as Diplomacy because, as it is difficult to attack and to defend oneself at the same time and as a single country did not necessarily have the force by itself to overcome an opponent, the object was to arrange strategic alliances and non-aggression pacts with other players while bluffing about your true intentions.

It was, however, a time consuming game. Even in the real world, diplomacy is a task that requires a slow and steady hand. Besides, the game could only really be played effectively if discussions could be clandestine. Diplomacy by megaphone, though fashionable, is counterproductive

What used to strike me as significant, however, was the characteristics of the nation being played did not reflect, as they would in any other game, the characteristics of the player. Rather it seemed that whoever played Russia, for example, or Britain, would always end up playing that country in the same way.

What is true in a game, I suspect, holds no less true in real life. Unlike that of most of its neighbours, Russian foreign policy has not changed significantly in 300 years, despite cataclysmic changes of regime. It would be naive of us therefore if we were to pretend that Russian foreign policy is likely to change now, rooted as it is in the country's geography and history.

I am sure that President Sarkozy of France, as president of the European Council, will bear this in mind as he steps on to the Moscow tarmac on Monday accompanied by Mr Barroso and Mr Solana, to discuss with Mr Putin and President Medvedev how best we move on from the Georgian imbroglio.

For, in a sense, Europe has been caught facing two ways. Ostensibly it has broken off the current round of partnership talks with Russia, designed to set a new framework for co-operation, until the Russians withdraw their troops, now occupying parts of Georgia, to the positions they held on 7 August.

Yet it is hard to see Monday's Kremlin talks other than as a re-invigorated attempt to find a secure basis for just such a partnership. If agreement can be reached on Georgia on the basis of some mutual understanding how much easier will be be to extend the same understanding to other issues? One does wonder, however, how much is likely to be achieved in a single short day. Given the importance and intractability of the issues, more time is surely needed for something worthwhile. 'Trop de zèle,' as Talleyrand might have sighed.

But whatever the length, it is surely important that we on the European side understand Russia's legitimate fears and aspirations which, of course, extend far beyond the Caucasus. These have been well rehearsed in the press - not least in an excellent analysis by Jan Oberg in these pages last week. Of course, to understand does not necessarily mean to agree, still less to cave in.

But by understanding the Russian position - including why so many actions taken, semi-innocently, by the West are seen as provocative and threatening by Moscow - we shall be better able to reach a positive conclusion rather than a conversation that remains a dialogue of the deaf, which is what occurs when politicians posture and issue empty threats.

We in Europe need also to understand (and with a degree of humility) how our own actions, over Kosovo in particular, are seen by Russia. It is no use saying, as French foreign minister Bernard Kouchner does, that Kosovo is 'unique.' Everywhere is 'unique' in that sense, including Georgia. As a reason for transgressing international law, uniqueness is worthless.

We Europeans like to pat ourselves on the back and tell the world how we have replaced 'war' with 'law.' We pride ourselves on our adherence to the principle of a rules-based international order, but we omit to add the rider - "when this suits us," as it didn't, as it happened, in Kosovo. That the United States has an even stronger stake in this hypocritical position should not cloud our judgement.

We accepted that international law should be broken when first we bombed Kosovo and Serbia and then again when a majority of member states recognised Kosovo's illegal independence. A number of European states also joined the equally illegal and ill-fated crusade into Iraq. With such stains on our collective conscience, it ill behoves us to lecture Russia about adhering to international law; we are both tarred with the same delinquent brush.

Yet once we accept this - admit that we have no moral superiority here - we can sit down on an equal basis with Russia and talk about how it would be in the interests of both parties to see a future in which we both, really and truly, abide by international law.

Heaven knows we need a stable and effective partnership with Russia - and not just to run our own inter-bloc relations - but for the wider world as well. Europe needs Russian help in the Security Council on issues such as Iran, militant Islam, the Middle East, climate change, nuclear proliferation and so forth.

This does not mean abandoning the Caucasus, still less backing down from fierce criticism of Russia's record on human rights and democracy. But it does mean ceasing to treat Russia as though she were simply a blank space on the map.

The issues at stake are complex. They include trade, security, energy, democracy all the way from the Arctic to the Black Sea. They will take time to resolve. We must be prepared for give and take. Russia is not the old Soviet Union bent on ideological domination by force. We can deal rationally with modern Russia.

Talk of a new cold war is simply short-sighted.

We both need a rules-based world. And we both need to help each other stick by those rules. Russia is better an ally than a foe.