Abkhazia insists independence from Georgia assured after disputed election

Another losing candidate, businessman Beslan Butba, reached by telephone, declined to comment directly on the outcome, but nonetheless sounded bitter.

"It proved impossible to overcome administrative resources," meaning various forms of official interference in the electoral process, Mr. Butba said. "As a result, I think Abkhazia is facing another five years of stagnation."

Abkhazia, a subtropical strip of soaring mountains and balmy beachfront wedged between Russia and Georgia, was once the tourist paradise of the former Soviet Union. Its ethnically-distinct Abkhaz population declared independence from Georgia following the collapse of the USSR and, with Russian aid, won it's de facto independence in a bitter civil war 16 years ago.

But it lived in a twilight world, unrecognized by anybody until last year's Russo-Georgian war encouraged Moscow to unilaterally grant it full independence. Even before that happened, Russian investment and tourists were flocking back to the tiny territory, where the rouble reigns supreme and the Russian language dominates the streets.

Russia currently has about 3,000 troops in Abkhazia, including 1,000 border guards, and has recently dispatched the first ships of what will be a squadron of ten coast guard gunboats to protect Abkhazian waters from the Georgian navy, which claims the right to territorial control.

"Russian leaders are satisfied with the Abkhazian elections," says Vladimir Zharikhin, deputy director of the official Institute of the Commonwealth of Independent States in Moscow. "Bagapsh is in favor of improving Abkhazia's economy through growing cooperation with Russia."

Abkhazian opposition candidates complained that almost 90 percent of all investment coming into the territory is from Russia and that all of the republic's prized beachfront property was in danger of being snapped up by foreigners.

The biggest objection to the legitimacy of Abkhazia's government comes from refugee groups, who point out that nearly 250,000 ethnic Georgians were driven from the territory during the bloody civil war in the early 1990's and have since been deprived of any say in the territory's future.

"The real problem here isn't how free and fair the elections [among Abkhazian voters] were, but the issue of who is allowed to vote," says Nikolai Petrov, a regional expert with the Carnegie Center in Moscow.

"No one doubts that Bagapsh is a popular leader among Abkhazians, but his re-election merely continues the status quo" in the international standoff over Abkhazia's future, he says.

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