This violence the first in a long time involves U.S. controlled Georgia and occurs right before the first ever ‘stand alone’ trilateral meeting of foreign ministers of India, Russia and China. This is a meeting the United States is not happy about.
If you remember the Beslan school siege and slaughter of the Russian school children was timed to postpone Putin’s trip to Turkey and discussion of the Trans-Thracian pipeline which it did much to the delight of the United States.
One should note the airliner explosions preceding the Beslan school siege coincided with Putin’s Sochi meeting with President Jacques Chirac of France and Chancellor Gerhard Schröder of Germany, another event the United States did not want to take place. #msg-4014279 #msg-3953878
NEW DELHI, MAY 29: In their first ever ‘stand alone’ trilateral meeting, foreign ministers of India, Russia and China will hold talks in Russia’s far-eastern Port city of Vladivostok next week on a whole spectrum of issues.
TBILISI, Georgia (AP) - A Georgian police officer and three suspected insurgents from South Ossetia were killed in an exchange of gunfire in the breakaway region Sunday, Georgian police and a representative of South Ossetia's separatist government said.
The gunfire broke out near a village north of the South Ossetia's capital, Tskhinvali, and was the first deadly violence reported in the tense region in months, according to police and a South Ossetian government spokeswoman.
South Ossetia broke away from central government control in a separatist war in the early 1990s, and tension has risen under Georgia's new president, Mikhail Saakashvili, who took office in January 2004 and pledged to bring South Ossetia and another breakaway region, Abkhazia, back into the fold.
Deadly fighting broke out between Georgian and separatist forces a year ago, but no deaths had been reported since two peacekeepers from a force that includes South Ossetians, Georgians and Russians were killed in October.
As in the past, the two sides accused each other of initiating Sunday's violence.
Vladimir Dzhugeli, chief of Georgian police for the region that technically includes South Ossetia, said a group of Georgian police were attacked by South Ossetian fighters near Kurta, a village 10 kilometres north of Tskhinvali. One officer was killed and three were wounded, and three of the attackers were killed, he said.
South Ossetian government spokeswoman Irina Gagloyeva said Georgian police opened fire on a car carrying South Ossetians, killing three and severely wounding another. She initially said the South Ossetians involved in the shootout were volunteer fighters, but later said she wasn't sure. Gagloyeva also said a Georgian policeman was killed.
Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili was heading to the vicinity of the shooting late Sunday.
South Ossetia receives informal support from neighbouring Russia despite Moscow's official recognition of Georgia's territorial integrity. Most residents of the region in northern Georgia have Russian passports, and its leader advocates uniting the region with the Russian province of North Ossetia, making it part of Russia.
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