National Olympic Committee of Georgia expressed a protest to the organizers of the Olympics Games in London, because they had published dossiers of the athletes on their site with mentioning the birthplace of the Russian national team member Besik Kudukhov as South Ossetia, the birthplace of another Russian athlete, Dennis Tsargush - Gudauta and next to the words of South Ossetia and Gudauta in parentheses is added "Russia."
NOC of Georgia is demanding the "immediate revision of the two athletes’ biographies with correction in their birthplace column as Georgia."
In South Ossetia this statement of Georgia has caused, at least, perplexity. The representatives of South Ossetian and Russian experts have commented on the statement of the Georgian NOC to IA "Res".
Yuri Vazagov - South Ossetian expert:
Georgia does not miss any opportunity to express its aggression once again, even if the regular obtrusion of its goals stuffs mouth. But when it comes to the point, it's just the policy of the international isolation of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. That is, blocking any ways for the citizens of South Ossetia and Abkhazia to enter the international arena; in the meantime, they offer the residents of these countries their so-called "neutral passports", which will never be the alternative to the Russian passports. So I consider this one more resounding statement of the Georgian authorities as a continuation of the previous policy of Georgia. But, as practice shows, these hysterical actions of the Georgian authorities are not effective. All the same, the citizens of South Ossetia and Abkhazia with the support of the Russian Federation will participate in the world sports and other events and will achieve good results.
Mikhail Chernov - a representative of the Association of Cross-Border Cooperation in Central Asia and Caucasus:
There is no any conspiracy in such competitions. Simply the international organizations, because of the reality itself, express the reality as it is actually. Specifying the appropriate places of birth -South Ossetia, Russia - is not a mistake; it's just a statement of facts by some part of the world community. Maybe, the Olympic Committee will satisfy the protest statement of Georgia due to some political reasons, but even with the best will of Georgia, mentioning Georgia as the birthplace of the athletes does not correspond to reality, because they were born in the Georgian SSR.
Jana Amelina-Section Head of the Caucasus Center of the Kazan regional and ethno-religious studies:
Indeed, annoying inaccuracies have crept into the files of these athletes. I think that Russia should ask the Olympic Committee to correct these errors: with regard to Kudukhov should be written '' South Ossetia'', and about the birth place of Tsargush - ''Abkhazia''. Many of us were born in the USSR, but now, filling in the various documents in the column "birthplace" we usually write "Russia", i.e. according to generally accepted rules, it is determined by the today`s situation.
So Georgia has absolutely nothing to do with this fact. It has enough athletes to monitor the accuracy of their dossiers, published on the site.
