Russia and the South Caucasus: Agendas, Priorities and Realities - 2019: Page 3 of 9

way, both on the Georgian and the Russian side, at least at the level of Russian tourists. How shall this factor be assessed for Russia and Georgia?

Gela Vasadze - Certainly, the topic of relations with Russia, or rather the topic of occupation, is a mobilizing factor. This is a win-win question - you talk about occupation, and no one will object. This, by the way, is an indicator of moods. ...Look how interesting it turns out to be, everything is quite simple in political relations between the Russian Federation and Georgia: as long as there is a fact of occupation, restoration of political relations with the Russian Federation is impossible. We talk a lot about this and we are milling the wind. Economic relations and especially issues of ownership of state corporations by the Russian Federation in the field of natural monopolies in Georgia are a topic of great interest, but no one talks about this, or they speak about this very superficially.

On the Domestic Political Significance of the Russian Theme in the South Caucasian Countries

Laura Baghdasaryan - In the morning I wrote about the factor of internal political culture and its significance for pursuing foreign policy partnership, too.

Judging by the media narratives in Russia, this huge country with a population of almost 150 million people has no problems of internal governance, administration, arrangement of public relations, except for issues of foreign policy importance – the USA, Ukraine, Syria, the arms race and much more. The refusal to register a number of candidates for participation in the Moscow Duma elections and the dispersal of rallies in Moscow, on the one hand, and the discussion topics these days on the programs of Russian TV channels, on the other hand, clearly demonstrated this gap between the real life of the country and the explicit myths about a hostile environment, also created by partner countries. I have a feeling that the fight against the so-called collective West is so prevailing over everything else that Russia treats its partners with emphasized suspicion. What if something happens? Meanwhile, every country has its own special significance for Russia. At least from the point of view of Russia's internal security. The very Georgia has not yet lost its significance for the settlement of certain issues in North Caucasus, a region that is so important and complex for Russia. Azerbaijan plays a definite role in this regard in terms of Dagestan. Armenia, if you just take only the domestic political dimension for Russia, nominally can play a role from the point of view of its huge diaspora, in my opinion, the 4th or 5th largest on the list of Russian national diasporas.

How does Russia evaluate the domestic political significance of its relations with the countries in the South Caucasus? Judging by the various results of opinion polls conducted in Russia, the attitude towards Armenia, Azerbaijan and Georgia is not always commensurate with the voiced political slogans in Russia itself.

Hikmet Haji-zade - Much has been written here about the search for new schemes in relations