Bloomberg Press
Putin Says `War Has Started,' Georgia Claims Invasion (Update4)
By Torrey Clark and Greg Walters
Aug. 8 (Bloomberg) -- Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said ``war has started'' over the breakaway region of South Ossetia as Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili accused its neighbor of a ``well-planned invasion.''
Saakashvili said in a Bloomberg Television interview that his nation of 4.6 million people is ``fighting to secure its borders'' amid a ``full-blown military aggression'' involving thousands of Russian troops. Aerial bombings and wide-spread fighting in and around the region killed an unknown number of civilians and wounded ``scores'' more, Saakashvili said.
Putin earlier today told U.S. President George W. Bush in Beijing that ``volunteers'' were pouring over the border to help defend South Ossetia from Georgian forces, according to Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov. ``War started today in South Ossetia'' when Georgia attacked Russian peacekeepers in the disputed region, Putin said. The Defense Ministry later said it deployed ``reinforcements'' in the region.
The ruble dropped the most against the dollar in 8 1/2 years and Russian stocks tumbled today on concern the conflict will worsen. The U.K., European Union and NATO, which Georgia is seeking to join, all called on both sides to end hostilities. The U.S. called for an immediate cease-fire.
Bush supports the ``territorial integrity'' of Georgia, White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said.
``We urge all parties, Georgians, South Ossetians and Russians, to de-escalate the tension and avoid conflict,'' Perino said in a statement from Beijing, where Bush and Putin attended the opening ceremony of the Olympic Games. ``We are working on mediation efforts to secure a cease fire and we are urging the parties to restart their dialogue.''
`NATO Hopes'
``Georgia's immediate NATO hopes have all but evaporated,'' Dominic Fean, a researcher at IFRI, the French Institute of International Affairs, said by telephone. ``Countries like Germany and France were already resistant to the idea of giving a NATO security guarantee to a country with an open dispute with Russia. I can't see how they can get the consensus of 26 states anytime soon.''
South Ossetia, which has a population of about 70,000 and is less than half the size of Kosovo, broke away from U.S.-backed Georgia in the early 1990s and now is a de facto independent state with Russian peacekeepers and economic support. The peacekeepers are deployed under a Commonwealth of Independent States mandate.
``We will not allow the deaths of our compatriots to go unpunished,'' Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, 42, said on state television after the Interfax news service said Russian troops were killed in Georgian shelling of a barracks and checkpoint. ``The guilty will get the punishment they deserve.''
Iraq Pullout
Georgia called today for an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council on South Ossetia.
``We've been encouraging everyone involved and every international party to engage in talks for years, months, days, hours,'' Georgian Prime Minister Lado Gurgenidze said by telephone. ``What we get is another column of Russian tanks.''
Georgia, the third-largest member of the allied coalition in Iraq after the U.S. and U.K., will bring home half of its 2,000 soldiers from the Middle East country in the next few days, Kakha Lomaia, head of Georgia's Security Council, said by telephone. The Georgian contingent is stationed in Al-Khut, 185 kilometers (114 miles) southeast of Baghdad.
Fighting escalated throughout the day, with Russian planes dropping four bombs on the Vaziani military base, which the North Atlantic Treaty Organization uses for training, Lomaia said. The base is about 15 kilometers from the Georgian capital.
Russian Tanks
Georgian forces have shot down three Russian planes since the fighting began, Lomaia said. Russia earlier bombed two Georgian towns, Gori and Kareli, he said. Russia's Foreign Ministry denied the bombing claim. The Defense Ministry denied losing aircraft.
Russian troops occupied parts of the South Ossetian capital Tskhinvali, Georgian Interior Ministry spokesman Shota Utiashvili said by telephone. Russian television showed tanks heading over the border to South Ossetia from the Russian region of North Ossetia at about 3:30 p.m. Moscow time.
``We find ourselves in a situation similar to where the Czechs were in 1968, to where the Hungarians found themselves in 1956,'' Lomaia said. ``All we can do is defend our freedom.''
Georgia last month increased the size of its military to 37,000 soldiers and today Saakashvili called up reservists and urged the nation to defend ``every meter'' of land. Russia has a standing army of about 1.1 million.
`Energy Corridor'
``Fighting continues,'' Russian Major General Marat Kulakhmetov, commander of Russia's peacekeeping forces in South Ossetia, said by mobile phone. The peacekeepers have suffered casualties, although it's too early to say how many, he said.
Georgia is a key link in a U.S.-backed ``southern energy corridor'' that links the Caspian Sea region with world markets, bypassing Russia, the world's biggest energy producer. Two pipelines pass through the country linking Azerbaijan and Turkey.
The BP Plc-led Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline, which has been closed since Aug. 5 due to an explosion in Turkey, runs about 100 kilometers south of the South Ossetian capital of Tskhinvali.
The most recent violence in the region erupted on Aug. 1, when South Ossetia said Georgian shelling of the regional capital Tskhinvali claimed six lives. Georgia said South Ossetian forces sparked the fighting.
``The conflict might be short and hot, but my sense is that neither party wants a prolonged conflict,'' said Michael Denison, associate fellow at London-based research group Chatham House and a professor of international security at the University of Leeds.
The EU, in a statement today expressed ``grave concern'' about the fighting and said it is ``working toward a cease fire.''
To contact the reporters on this story: Greg Walters in Moscow gwalters1@bloomberg.net; Torrey Clark in Moscow at tclark8@bloomberg.net
