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EU observers begin monitoring Russia-Georgia ceasefire
European Union observers began monitoring a ceasefire between Russia and Georgia on Wednesday following a brief war in August, though without access yet to the Russian-controlled conflict zone.
- Agencies
- Published: 09:42 October 1, 2008
- Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili speaks at a news conference in Tbilisi, Georgia. Russian troops have allowed a group of European Union monitors to enter a buffer zone on the edge of Georgia's separatist province of South Ossetia despite an earlier warning to them to stay out of the area.
- Image Credit: AP
Tblisi: European Union observers began monitoring a ceasefire between Russia and Georgia on Wednesday following a brief war in August, though without access yet to the Russian-controlled conflict zone.
Under the terms of a French-brokered pullback deal, the 200-plus monitors are initially to oversee the withdrawal of Russian troops from two "security zones" deep inside Georgian territory, set up after their five-day war in early August.
As the mission started, four patrols of two cars each set out from a lakeside compound in the village of Bazaleti, around 40 km (25 miles) north of Tbilisi, towards the eastern side of the breakaway region of South Ossetia. An EU official said the patrols would be establishing contact with the local population.
The Russian military said on Tuesday the unarmed civilian monitors would only be allowed as far as the edge of the security zones adjacent to South Ossetia and Georgia's other breakaway, pro-Moscow region Abkhazia.
The EU mission hopes to coordinate a "step-by-step" withdrawal of Russian forces and simultaneous return of Georgian police to the buffer zones to avoid a security vacuum that could be exploited by roaming militias.
Russian forces pushed deep into Georgian territory last month after a Georgian offensive to retake South Ossetia, in a war that shook Western confidence in the Caucasus as a transit route for oil and gas from the Caspian Sea.
Georgia said Russia was trying to "prolong the process" but that the 10-day countdown to the withdrawal from undisputed Georgian territory would begin on Wednesday.
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