And testing breakaway signpost pillars.

There's oil spills, environmental disasters, water rights disputes, breakaway republics, famine, endangered species and global warming.

In the case of JEM, breakaway groups called into question the legitimacy of its representatives in Abuja.

An international assessment of the huge stockpiles of weapons and ammunition in the breakaway region was imperative.

Look at the rogue breakaway regions in Moldova and Georgia that exist only because of the Kremlin s backing.

Its main goal is to inhibit Western support for Georgia, and to prevent reconciliation with the breakaway regions.

Russia could also react beyond the Balkans, most obviously in the Caucasus, with its breakaway regions, particularly in Georgia.

Plans for a union with Romania were abandoned, and the new Constitution gave autonomy to the breakaway Transnistria and Gagauzia.

A declaration of independence by Kosovo will likely bring a similar declaration from Georgia s breakaway Abkhazia region, which Russia could well recognize.

After Russia sent troops into Georgia in August 2008, it recognized the independence of two breakaway Georgian provinces, South Ossetia and Abkhazia.

The heads of the 27 EU governments also characterized the Kremlin s decision to recognize the independence of the two breakaway regions as unacceptable.

Russian recognition was widely seen as retaliation for Western recognition of Kosovo (population two million), the breakaway province of Serbia, earlier last year.

Here, there is a real danger that Russia may recognize breakaway regions in the South Caucasus, and back them more strongly than it does now.

Both the government and the breakaway Republic of Biafra accepted a truce to allow his team, Santos, to play two exhibition matches against local teams.

The worry is that Russia will unilaterally recognize the breakaway Moldovan territory of Transdnistria, which Russian troops and criminal gangs have been propping up for 16 years.

Russia has set forth various reasons to justify its armed intervention in Georgia, where the breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia are nonetheless under Georgian sovereignty.

However, breakaway members of the Alliance, including members of CP, have registered in time under the banner of the Freedom Front and will be participating in the elections.

(Russia has also tried heavy handed tactics on Moldova by threatening to ban the country s wine exports to Russia and to recognize the independence of the breakaway territory of Transnistria.)

This may not be the case with for this September s Caucasus 2012 , which Russia is planning to hold with forces from the breakaway Georgian provinces of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

LONDON A year ago, tiny Georgia tried to regain control over its breakaway enclave of South Ossetia. The Russians quickly expelled the Georgian army, to almost universal opprobrium from the West.

Even before Vladimir Putin became Russia s president, the Kremlin was making mischief in Georgia, issuing Russian passports to citizens of Abkhazia (the largest breakaway region) and pouring money into its economy.

This is one reason why Russia has become so aggressive with its neighbors, Ukraine and Georgia, and seeks to maintain a military presence in places like Transdniestria, the breakaway region of Moldova.

Renewed conflict in Abkhazia would not only bring the risk of open warfare with Russia, but strain relations with Armenia, as there are near to 50,000 Armenians in Abkhazia who support the breakaway government.

. The concerns of the Freedom Alliance, now largely made up of three organizations, IFP, CP and the Afrikaanse Weerstandbeweging (AWB) the Afrikaner Resistance Movement), and shared by the breakaway Freedom Front, are as follows

Each of the breakaway factions of ULIMO and the NPFL, together with the LPC and LDF, have joined in a coalition of forces to fight the branch of NPFL led by Mr. Charles Taylor.

We have also re launched settlement talks concerning the breakaway region of Transdniestria, where the only viable basis for a solution is to make Moldova ever more economically and politically attractive to the region s residents.

Recent events in Georgia remind us that resolving the region's frozen conflicts i.e., those in the breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, of Transdneistria in Moldova, and Nagorno Karabakh in Azerbaijan must be a priority.

So far, only Russia and Nicaragua recognize the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Russian recognition was widely seen as retaliation for Western recognition of Kosovo (population two million), the breakaway province of Serbia, earlier last year.

This approach accounts for the failure of Dmitri Kozak s plan for resolving the situation in Moldova s breakaway Trans Dniester region, as well as for the ludicrous state of affairs that has arisen in Georgia s separatist Abkhazia region.

Georgia has tried to defuse tensions over Abkhazia and South Ossetia, but Russia accuses Georgia of aggression and ethnic cleansing. Its main goal is to inhibit Western support for Georgia, and to prevent reconciliation with the breakaway regions.

He persuaded the European Union and the United States to allow continued UN oversight in Kosovo while gradually permitting self governance all without triggering dangerous confrontations with the two states which oppose its breakaway, Serbia and its close ally, Russia.

With Russian soldiers stationed in Georgia's breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, a group of Forum.ge users proposed to mark the Defender of the Fatherland Day on February 23, by posting anti occupation comments on Russian President Dmitry Medvedev's Facebook page .

The human rights record of the former breakaway regime of Mr. Abdic gave cause for serious concern and the Special Rapporteur, in his discussions with Mr. Abdic, identified a wilful disregard by him for the rights of people under his de facto control.

And yet he controversially but rightly held out a hand of friendship to the breakaway region of Somaliland, before it became fashionable, and went as far as he could short of formal re recognition of that ray of democratic hope in the Horn of Africa.

This is the case in Lebanon with Hezbollah, in Palestine with Hamas, in Iraq with Moqtada al Sadr s Mahdi Army and scores of other groups, with the Taliban and tribal warlords in Afghanistan, and with breakaway movements in Pakistan that have been emboldened by Pervez Musharaf s resignation.

Previously, Russia s admission to the WTO had been blocked by Georgia, which lifted its veto last year after a feat of elegant diplomacy that established a border control mechanism without recognizing the breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia either as part of Georgia or as independent countries.

Eighteen months ago, a war took place in Europe between Russia and Georgia. It was a little war, but one that raised big questions. It was not fought over the future status of Georgia s Russian backed breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia (though that source of conflict was a real one).

The Head of the special mission also met Mr. Rabbani with Mr. Mohammed Nabi Mohammadi and Mr. Akbari (leader of a breakaway faction of Hezb i Wahdat) and emphasized that all sides in the fighting, including General Dostum, had to be represented in the political process if the goal of ending the fighting was to be achieved.