The situation remained tense on November 17 in Georgia’s Russia-backed breakaway region of Abkhazia, with the self-styled president saying no compromise had been reached with the opposition. Protesters were still reported to be inside the parliament compound in the capital, Sukhumi, which they stormed on November 15 in protest over an investment deal with Moscow. The region’s de facto leader, Aslan Bzhania, had said on November 16 that he would resign once protesters left the compound.
However, later that day, Bzhania met with his cabinet in his hometown of Tamysh to discuss "ways to stabilize the situation that arose." There were fears of escalating violence amid the storming of the parliament, which followed weeks of tensions in a region whose independence Moscow has backed since a five-day war against Georgian forces in 2008 over another breakaway Georgian province, South Ossetia. Opposition leaders have demanded not only the permanent abandonment of a proposed deal with Russia that opponents say would unfairly open the property market to wealthy Russians, but also Bzhania's resignation and those of his vice president and the breakaway leadership's prime minister.
"The situation will be stabilized. We will return everything to the legal framework,” Bzhania's press service quoted him as saying on November 16. He reportedly added that "the entire country" -- which is overwhelmingly regarded as Georgian territory internationally -- "is controlled by the legitimate autho.
