Russia sends forces into Georgian rebel conflict

[Old Hippie]

Oh great...

[chuckwoww]

What's the matter? You don't want to help plucky little Georgia fight the Russian Bear? We're all Georgians now.

[Faustian]

This could be a highly provocative move...cold war part deux...

[chuckwoww]

It depends. Saakashvili will be trying to get US troops involved in the fighting. Bush may be put in a no win position. So far I notice Bush has been quite careful with his language...he 'expects Russia to respect Georgian sovereignty' but he doesn't say if that includes South Ossetia or not.

[Flashermac]

Amid promise of peace, Georgians live in terror

 

 

The first armoured personnel carrier nudged past the top of the hill. It paused as if getting its bearings, and then set off towards Tbilisi. Behind it, an endless column of Russian military vehicles appeared on a shimmering horizon - trucks, tankers, and a beaten-up Nissan.

 

The Russian army was on the move. What wasn't clear was where it was going. For the next hour the column continued its sedate progress, past yellow fields and a hazy mountain valley, from Gori towards the Georgian capital,Tbilisi.

 

Thirty miles from the city, it stopped. A Russian soldier hopped out of his vehicle and began directing traffic. "We've been told to stay there," he explained, pointing down a rough dirt track towards the rustic hamlet of Orjosari, just over a mile away.

 

The soldier said Russia didn't intend to keep going down the main highway connecting Tbilisi to Gori, and the east and west of the country. "The only reason we've come here is because of a provokazia by Mikheil Saakashvili," he said, accusing Georgia's president of wrongdoing.

 

In theory the conflict between Russia and Georgia is now over, as European negotiators led by France's president, Nicolas Sarkozy, hammer out a peace deal. In reality, Russia's mighty war machine was trundling insouciantly through Georgia.

 

Several Russian trucks overshot and missed their turning. One broke down. A soldier got the wheezing vehicle going again. Where was he from? "Chechnya. We've come here to help," he said.

 

[color:red]For the terrified residents of Gori and surrounding villages, it didn't seem like help. Yesterday morning, as the Russian tanks advanced from their base in South Ossetia they passed through Georgian controlled-villages, telling residents to hang out white flags or be shot.

[/color]

[color:red]Behind them, according to people fleeing those villages, came a militia army of Chechen and Ossetian volunteers who had joined up with the regular Russian army. The volunteers embarked on an orgy of looting, burning, murdering and rape, witnesses claimed, adding that the irregulars had carried off young girls and men.

[/color]

"They killed my neighbour's 15-year-old son. Everyone was fleeing in panic," Larisa Lazarashvili, 45, said. "The Russian tanks arrived at our village at 11.20am. We ran away. We left everything - our cattle, our house, and our possessions."

 

Achiko Khitarishvili, 39, from Berbuki, added: "They were killing, burning and stealing. My village isn't in a conflict zone. It's pure Georgia."

 

These claims of Russian atrocities were impossible to verify. But the mood of panic was real enough - with villagers fleeing towards Tbilisi by all means possible. One family of eight piled into a tiny white Lada; others fled on tractors.

 

For much of the day the Russian troops in Gori were busying destroying Georgia's military infrastructure. Smoke poured from the military supply camp in the village of Uplistsikhe.

 

Those who fled expressed a feeling of betrayal. They said Russia's president, Dmitry Medvedev, had duped them. "I believed him when he said there was peace. That's why we stayed in our homes. But it isn't true," Lamzika Tushmali, 62, said. She added: "There is no ceasefire."

 

At the end of the Russian column, a group of volunteers arrived in a shabby mini-van flying a Russian flag. One of them had his face covered with a balaclava; all were heavily armed; their mood was exuberant. What were they doing? "We've come for a holiday," one said.

 

For most of the day there was no sign of the Georgian army. After five days of ferocious bombardment by Russian warplanes, it appears not to exist. With rumours swirling of an imminent Russian attack on Tbilisi, however, Georgia mustered a platoon of 50 soldiers, who took up positions 10 miles down the road from where the Russians appeared to have parked up for the night.

 

On Georgian radio, meanwhile, military experts were discussing the possibility of a new partisan war against the Russians - suggesting that the government's failure meant that it was time for ordinary Georgians to take the initiative.

 

It's an idea that may take root. "I spent two years in the Soviet army. If there is a partisan army I'll be in the first row," Koba Chkhirodze, 41, said yesterday.

 

 

Just like old times ...

 

 

 

[Flashermac]

Bush squares up to Vladimir Putin over Georgia

 

 

President Bush dispatched US military hardware to the heart of the Caucasus yesterday and warned Russia that it could be frozen out of international bodies as punishment for its aggression in Georgia.

 

In his toughest criticism of Russia since becoming President, Mr Bush accused it of breaching the provisional ceasefire agreed with Georgia only 24 hours earlier.

 

He cited intelligence showing that Russian troops had again taken the town of Gori and could threaten the capital, Tbilisi. He insisted that Moscow respect the former Soviet republicâ??s territorial integrity. There were also reports of Russian-backed militia in South Ossetia looting ethnic Georgian villages and killing inhabitants.

 

â??To begin to repair the damage to its relations with the United States, Europe and other nations, and to begin restoring its place in the world, Russia must keep its word and act to end this crisis,â? Mr Bush said.

 

The US is in talks with allies about whether to suspend Russiaâ??s membership of the G8 club of industrialised nations. There is a growing clamour to block Russiaâ??s membership of the World Trade Organisation and to rescind an invitation for it to join the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.

 

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More

 

 

[Julian2]

Oliphant says...

 

[waerth]

Unfortunately Putin is still trying

 

W aka S

[Flashermac]

Kremlin announces that South Ossetia will join 'one united Russian state'

 

 

The Kremlin moved swiftly to tighten its grip on Georgiaâ??s breakaway regions yesterday as South Ossetia announced that it would soon become part of Russia, which will open military bases in the province under an agreement to be signed on Tuesday.

 

Tarzan Kokoity, the provinceâ??s Deputy Speaker of parliament, announced that South Ossetia would be absorbed into Russia soon so that its people could live in â??one united Russian stateâ? with their ethnic kin in North Ossetia.

 

The declaration came only three days after Russia defied international criticism and recognised South Ossetia and Georgiaâ??s other separatist region of Abkhazia as independent states. Eduard Kokoity, South Ossetiaâ??s leader, agreed that it would form part of Russia within â??several yearsâ? during talks with Dmitri Medvedev, the Russian President, in Moscow.

 

The disclosure will expose Russia to accusations that it is annexing land regarded internationally as part of Georgia. Until now, the Kremlin has insisted that its troops intervened solely to protect South Ossetia and Abkhazia from Georgian â??aggressionâ?Â.

 

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Just like old times ...

[chuckwoww]

Just like old times ...

 

That's what the entire Western press seems to be saying. Looks to me like the Abkhazians and South Ossetians are happy to leave Georgia after what Saakashvili did.