RUSSIA: Georgia has withdrawn its soldiers from strategic positions in the breakaway region of South Ossetia, to the relief of diplomats in the United States and Russia who had feared the imminent outbreak of war in the Caucasus nation. Daniel McLaughlin reports from Moscow
As Moscow and Washington urged negotiations to defuse the simmering conflict, which left more than a dozen people dead after a week of nightly clashes, officials yesterday in Georgia and South Ossetia both warned about the danger of renewed fighting.
"The high ground occupied the day before by our units has been handed over to the peacekeeping contingent deployed there," said Aleko Kinkadze, commander of the Georgian peacekeepers in South Ossetia.
Pro-Russian officials in South Ossetia, which won de facto independence from Tbilisi in a 1992 war, said the pull-out was little more than a publicity stunt by Georgia's president, Mr Mikhail Saakashvili.
"This is a theatrical gesture by the government and the Georgian president, which are trying to maintain a democratic face," said Ms Irina Gagloyeva, a spokeswoman for a South Ossetian régime allegedly supported by Moscow and funded by lucrative smuggling operations in the province.
The fiery Mr Saakashvili, a US- educated lawyer, has pledged to reunite a country which was fractured by civil war following the collapse of the Soviet Union. He blames Russia for supporting secessionist leaders in South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
"There will be many more such gifts in the future," Mr Saakashvili said after announcing that his forces had "wiped out" separatists responsible for killing Georgian soldiers in South Ossetia.
"I recognise our responsibility and so I want us to use all methods to avoid conflict and use what is a last chance for achieving peace," he said of his decision to withdraw troops, which came under heavy pressure from Soviet- era master Moscow and key ally Washington.
A US State Department spokesman, Mr Adam Ereli, said: "We certainly welcome this move. It sends the right signal and we call on all sides to build on this proposal to reduce tensions and to move the political process forward."
The US, a major lender to Georgia, has trained its troops and is funding a pipeline across the country to take Caspian Sea oil to Western markets. Russia still has military bases in Georgia and is desperate to maintain influence over its former Soviet subjects.
"We trust that all the participants in the \ process will show political maturity and responsibility in the interests of their people," the Russian President, Mr Vladimir Putin, said. "They need to sit down at the negotiating table, know how to reach agreement and have the political will to fulfil their agreements."
Moscow and Tbilisi have accused each other of trying to spark war in South Ossetia, where Russia has handed out thousands of passports in recent months. Georgia also claims that Moscow is supplying arms to South Ossetia, and that Russian Cossacks have crossed into the province to fight alongside the separatists.