House Divided

by Daro Sulakauri for the 2017 Joop Swart Masterclass

Georgia, Khurcha Village. Nana, 9, is one of the seven siblings in the family. She is a folk dancer and wishes to someday become famous. Her mother is from Gali, Abkhazia. Before March, Khurcha was a village of one of the main checkpoints between the de facto region of Abkhazia and Georgian controlled territory. Now, as the Russians have closed their borders, the village has become quiet and isolated.

What does it feel like when you are living on the edge… to be perpetually on the edge of losing, say, a part of your house? Or waking up to find that your house is divided with your living room in your own country, but your kitchen now residing within enemy-occupied territory?

Occupants of villages in Ossetia must prepare for this reality, and more of them are having such experiences as time passes. After a brief war in 2008, Georgia lost another portion of its territory to Russian occupation, making South Ossetia a de facto ‘breakaway’ region. This volatile situation has been percolating ever since, for more than nine years. (A similar dynamic occurred in the early 1990’s between Georgia’s Abkhazia region and Russian ‘peacekeeping’ troops.) Since those conflicts occurred, occupying Russian forces continue to play psychological games with nearby residents, including the phenomenon of ‘creeping borders’ which change without notice with little to no attention — much less pushback — from the international community.

Khurcha-Nabakevi checkpoint. Once you cross the bridge you are no longer in a territory controlled by Georgia. Children swim here, sometimes crossing the border. A small stream of Enguri River separates the checkpoint between Khurcha and Nabakevi, which is patrolled by Russian border guards and Abkhaz customs officers. There are no police on the Georgia-controlled part of the crossing.

Russian occupation and the shifting of so-called “administrative borders” is encroaching on the Georgian territory. No one really knows where the line is anymore—it is so mutable, in many places it remains completely unmarked. When out for a walk, Georgian villagers find themselves in Russian-occupied territory without realizing, resulting in Russian border guards arresting them.
It is said that the border is most likely based on an old Soviet topographic map from the 1980s.

Astounded that my country’s territorial limits could be so overtly tampered with on such a regular basis, I started to photograph various villages that border the occupied territories. I was looking for answers. What I found was a deepening mystery.

Georgia, Nikozi Village. The village was heavily bombed during the Georgian-Russian war in 2008. A priest from Nikozi was separated from his congregation for years and threatened that if he went across the administrative border he would never be allowed back in. He had to live on the South Ossetian side for years without ever knowing if he would again be allowed back in to his homeland.

Georgia, Orsantia Village. Children swim on the de facto region of Abkhazia and Georgian-controlled territory. A small stream of Enguri River separates the region and the river is used as a borderline.

As the border creeps between Georgian-controlled and Russian-controlled territory in South Ossetia—a daily process that is ongoing and completely unheralded—the local residents of the so-called ‘conflict zones’, who often do not have access to reliable wifi or cellular connections, live with constant uncertainty despite the fact that their homes lie only 100 km away from the Georgian capital, Tbilisi. They can visit relatives on the other side of barbed wire “borders’ ONLY with permission from the occupying forces. They can literally wake up one morning to find their home is no longer in their homeland.

Village Tkhaia, Georgia, 2017. Tengo Mikava, 57, was kidnapped by the Russian soldiers: “I was fishing, they quietly creeped behind my back and pointed the gun on my feet telling me to move. I was taken in Gali in Abkhazia and fined for illegal crossing. This happened a day after Vladimir Putin visited Abkhazia, on August 9th.” In the photo, he is standing in the place where he was kidnapped, a zone unsafe at night.

My photographs are of the people who are most directly affected: the residents themselves. I photographed their homes, their villages, their surroundings—places where they experienced key events in their lives as part of a post-conflict reality. Here are a few vignettes from the lives of these victims of ‘border creep’, or ‘border flow’. I hope to bring a small relief to them, these ordinary citizens whose voices have been silenced by happenstance, and to raise awareness about the illegal actions at the administrative boundary lines.

Georgia, 2017. The Village is one of the hot points of “borderization” by the Russians. The family (who wish to remain nameless) live right near the barbed wire fence. Their house wall is leaning on the border of the de facto region of South Ossetia. The man asked me to erase his face, saying, “I will be much more safer this way, I don’t want my face to show, you never know what can happen, I have the border in my back yard.”

For updates on the project, follow me on Instagram: @darosulakauri

This story was created for the 2017 Joop Swart Masterclass, which has been organized by the World Press Photo Foundation every year since 1994 and has established itself as one of the most prestigious events of its kind. Its goal is to bring together some of the most experienced individuals in photojournalism with 12 young, promising photographers to share and pass on their knowledge and experience. Learn how to apply.

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