Facing War and Hardship, Georgia Finally to Join Commonwealth

MOSCOW — Georgian leader Eduard A. Shevardnadze, his relations with Moscow strained almost to the breaking point in recent weeks, said Friday that his country has decided to enter the Commonwealth of Independent States.

Shevardnadze announced his decision to Russian journalists after talks with Russian President Boris N. Yeltsin in the Kremlin.

“I am convinced such a step is in Georgia’s interests,” the Interfax news agency quoted him as saying.

The decision to join the Commonwealth was not an easy one for Shevardnadze, whose country is fiercely independence-minded.

But Tbilisi urgently needs Moscow’s help to counter widespread political, economic and ethnic turmoil.

Georgia’s entry into the Commonwealth, probably at its next summit, would bring the body’s membership to 12.

In Tbilisi, the news was met with grudging acceptance. Some women wept with grief in public upon hearing the announcement.

Relations with the Kremlin had deteriorated sharply in recent months with the worsening of a civil war over the Black Sea coastal province of Abkhazia--one of several insurgencies Shevardnadze’s government is fighting. Shevardnadze accused Russia of betraying Georgia after the fall of the province to Abkhaz forces.