Violence Escalates In Georgia

VPM | By Scott Simon and Gregory Feifer

Published August 9, 2008 at 12:00 PM EDT

Updated July 11, 2023

SCOTT SIMON, host:

Military operations continue today in the Republic of Georgia as separatist warplanes bombed the Kodori Gorge. Georgian President Mikheil – forgive me. Mikhail – forgive me. Georgian President Saakashvili called for an immediate cease-fire, and President Bush spoke with the president and with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev urging them both to stand down. NPR’s Gregory Feifer is in Moscow. He spoke today with the Georgian security adviser and the Russian foreign minister. Gregory, thank you very much for being with us.

GREGORY FEIFER: Hi, Scott.

SIMON: Georgia has just declared a state of war. What does that mean?

FEIFER: It’s not exactly clear. The national security adviser said that it means parliament will essentially always be in session and it gives the government additional powers, but that it wouldn’t affect media freedom or individual freedoms. He also said that a state of war isn’t the same as martial law. But at the same time, President Saakashvili is calling for an immediate cease-fire. He has said that he has ordered Georgian troops not to fire at Russian positions outside the South Ossetian capital, Tskhinvali.

I think the state of war, the main purpose is declarative. Georgia says it’s under a full-scale attack from Russia. It says Russian planes are bombing targets in different parts of the country, including, as you said, the Kodori Gorge which is in Georgia’s second separatist region, Abkhazia. Georgia also says that Russian planes tried to bomb a strategically important oil pipeline to the west but that the bombs missed.

SIMON: Gregory, since this will capture the attention from much of the rest of the world for the next few days, weeks, and perhaps beyond, remind us what’s all this about?

FEIFER: Well, Russia says that it’s only conducting peacekeeping operations, that it’s stopping what it calls Georgia’s aggressive move to take control over its pro-Moscow separatist region, South Ossetia. But it’s – the Georgians say exactly the opposite. The Georgians are saying, as I said, that Russia has staged an invasion of Georgian territory. It’s comparing Russia’s actions to the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979.

Georgia says that it’s unclear how long it can hold out, and it’s appealing for international mediation. At the same time, Russia is saying that there are somewhere around 30,000 refugees streaming into Russia from South Ossetia. And both sides are accusing each other of ethnic cleansing.

SIMON: Yeah. And is there anything to support that charge at the moment?

FEIFER: There’s nothing to support it right now. It’s not clear in the next few days what’s going to happen. There is an international delegation of diplomats traveling to Tbilisi, but Russia is saying that it will not stop military operations until Georgia pulls out all of its forces out of South Ossetia.

SIMON: NPR’s Gregory Feifer on duty in Moscow. Thanks very much for being with us, Gregory.

FEIFER: You’re welcome. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.

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Scott Simon

Scott Simon is one of America's most admired writers and broadcasters. He is the host of Weekend Edition Saturday and is one of the hosts of NPR's morning news podcast Up First. He has reported from all fifty states, five continents, and ten wars, from El Salvador to Sarajevo to Afghanistan and Iraq. His books have chronicled character and characters, in war and peace, sports and art, tragedy and comedy.

Weekend Edition Saturday has been called by the Washington Post, "the most literate, witty, moving, and just plain interesting news show on any dial," and by Brett Martin of Time Out New York, "the most eclectic, intelligent two hours of broadcasting on the airwaves." Simon has won every major award in broadcasting, including the Peabody, the Emmy, the Columbia-DuPont, the Ohio State Award, the Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award, and the Sidney Hillman Award. He received the Presidential End Hunger Award for his coverage of the Ethiopian civil war and famine, and a special citation from the Peabody Awards for his weekly essays, which were cited as "consistently thoughtful, graceful, and challenging." He has also received the Barry M. Goldwater Award from the Human Rights Fund. Recently, he was awarded the Studs Terkel Award.

Simon has hosted many television specials, including the PBS's "State of Mind," "Voices of Vision," and "Need to Know." "The Paterson Project" won a national Emmy, as did his two-hour special from the Rio Earth Summit meeting. He co-anchored PBS's "Millennium 2000" coverage in concert with the BBC, and has co-hosted the televised Columbia-DuPont Awards. He also became familiar to viewers in Great Britain as host of the continuing BBC series, "Eyewitness," and a special on the White House press corps. He has appeared as a guest and commentator on all major networks, including BBC, NBC, CNN, and ESPN.

Simon has contributed articles to The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, The New York Times Book Review, The Wall Street Journal, The Sunday Times of London, The Guardian, and Gourmet among other publications, and won a James Beard Award for his story, "Conflict Cuisine" in Gourmet. He has received numerous honorary degrees.

Sports Illustrated called his book Home and Away: Memoir of a Fan "extraordinary...uniformly superb...a memoir of such breadth and reach that it compares favorably with Fredrick Exley's A Fan's Notes." It was at the top of several non-fiction bestseller lists. His book, and Jackie Robinson and the Integration of Baseball, was Barnes and Noble's Sports Book of the Year. His novel, Pretty Birds, the story of two teenage girls in Sarajevo during the siege, received rave reviews, with Scott Turow calling it, "the most auspicious fiction debut by a journalist of note since Tom Wolfe's. . . always gripping, always tender, and often painfully funny. It is a marvel of technical finesse, close observation, and a perfectly pitched heart." Windy City, Simon's second novel, is a political comedy set in the Chicago City Council. Baby, We Were Meant for Each Other, an essay about the joys of adoption, was published in August 2010.

Simon's tweets to his 1.25 million Twitter followers from his mother's bedside in the summer of 2013 gathered major media attention around the world. They inspired his New York Times bestseller book Unforgettable: A Son, a Mother, and the Lessons of a Lifetime. Laura Hillenbrand, the author of Unbroken and Seabiscuit, called the book "poignant, funny, intimate, and unforgettable." Scott Turow called it "a treasure. It is as poignant and tender and wise as Tuesdays with Morrie, with the added virtues of being unflinching and, quite often, very funny." Laurie Halse Anderson just called the book, "Amazing. Breathtaking. Affirming. This book will change lives, restore hopes to the brokenhearted, and remind the rest of us what is truly important." Carlos Lozado of The Washington Post called it, in a rave review, "a book that easily matches its title."

Simon also wrote the book Just Getting Started with Tony Bennett. His latest books is My Cubs: A Love Story about his lifelong fandom of the Chicago Cubs, and their historic World Series victory.

Simon is a native of Chicago and the son of comedian Ernie Simon and Patricia Lyons Simon. He is married to Caroline Richard Simon, and their daughters are Elise and Paulina. His hobbies are books, theater, ballet, British comedy, Mexican cooking, and "bleeding for the Chicago Cubs." He has thrown out the first pitch at Wrigley Field (low and outside) and appeared as Mother Ginger in the Ballet Austin production of The Nutcracker. Scott received the Order of Lincoln from the State of Illinois in 2016, the state's highest honor. He adds, "If you prick me, I'll bleed Chicago Cubs blue."

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