Courting Europe: Diplomatic Battlegrounds and the Georgian–Abkhazian Conflict
Journal: Irish Studies in International Affairs
Year: 2025

ABSTRACT: This article critically engages with Georgian narratives that frame the Georgian–Abkhazian conflict as a confrontation with Russia rather than with Abkhazians: a discourse that denies Abkhazians’ agency and recasts them as hostages of Russian power. It revisits a pivotal moment: the EU’s recognition of Georgia’s Soviet borders, which included Abkhazia, in 1992. Rather than reflecting a neutral stance on a complex territorial dispute, EU recognition empowered an unelected Georgian junta