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In the Lopota Valley, a picturesque spot situated near Georgia's mountainous northeast border with Russia's Dagestani autonomous region, a series of skirmishes took place on the 28th and 29th of August 2012 that cost the lives of two troops from elite units of the Georgian Ministry of the Interior, a military doctor, and eleven gunmen identified as North Caucasus Islamist insurgents, leaving a few Georgian military personnel injured and one insurgent, a Russian citizen, captured by Georgian special forces. While the circumstances of what happened in the vicinity of the north Kakhetian village of Lapankuri have not yet been sufficiently revealed, the event might have considerable implications for the security situation in the entire region of the North and South Caucasus. The purpose of this article is to analyze various perspectives and issues related to this incident and to prove that the hostage crisis in the Lopota Valley indicates the existence of and the foreshadowing of much greater regional instability. The article shall outline the general course of events and those responsible for the incident. It will then introduce various perspectives on the incident from Georgian, Russian, and Dagestani authorities and sources, and analyze the short-term and long-term implications of the incident.Background of the EventsThe official version of the events presented by the Georgian authorities shortly after this skirmish took place states that in the woods to the east of the village of Lapankuri, a group of five Georgian youngsters was captured by Islamist insurgents who had most likely penetrated the Georgian territory from Dagestan. In subsequent negotiations, the Georgian youngsters were freed in exchange for one or two police officers, and the Georgian authorities then suggested that the jihadists lay down their arms and surrender, a demand that was declined by the insurgents. It is not entirely clear what exactly followed at this point, except for the fact that Georgian security forces supported by military helicopters and aerial vehicles eventually managed to destroy the majority of the group of insurgents, which consisted of sixteen to twenty people, while the rest of the group was most likely able to retreat.1News spread of the burial in Georgia's Duisi district of three Kists,2 members of an ethnic sub-group of the Chechens inhabiting the Pankisi Gorge region,3 located approximately 40 km to the northwest of the village of Lapankuri. According to this news (which eventually turned out to be true), at least three Kists, citizens of Georgia, were killed in the incident, while some others killed belonged to Georgia's Chechen community that arrived in the early 2000s,4 when thousands of Chechens escaping the Second Chechen War had moved southward, finding refuge among their ethnic kin in the Kist villages spread across the Pankisi Gorge.5 This was supported by some eyewitness accounts from among the Lapankuri villagers, according to whom at least some of the insurgents were fluent in Georgian. The rest of the slain insurgents were Russian citizens whose surnames and places of birth indicated their overwhelmingly Chechen origin.6Varying Perceptions of the IncidentAccording to one explanation of this incident, the Kists recruited in the Pankisi Gorge were in the process of moving to Syria, where they allegedly intended to take part in the local civil war on the side of the Sunni opposition.7 In this case, it remains unclear why they were moving along the opposite path instead of traveling to Tbilisi and then to the Georgian-Turkish border.Furthermore, Georgia's President Saakashvili suggested that Russia was involved in the incident. He was quick to visit Lapankuri and assert that what had happened in the Lopota Valley was "in the interest of our enemy," i.e., Russia, a country that according to some Georgian officials and commentators was most likely testing the preparedness of the Georgian security forces, who in the end managed to heroically defend their land and people. …

The Armed Incident in Georgia’s Lopota Valley and its Implications for the Security Situation of the South Caucasus