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A car bomb blast near Russia's peacekeeping headquarters in South Ossetia has left six military personnel killed and four others injured. The explosion took place on Friday near the command post of the Russian peacekeepers in Tskhinvali, the capital of the independence-leaning republic. The car, with some quantities of arms in it, was seized earlier in a nearby village, said South Ossetia's press department, AP reported.

The site of Nikozi Church dates back to the fifth century and is known to Georgians as the Church of the First Martyr. ... The Soviets expunged all religious activity there with particular force because Stalin hailed from the nearby town of Gori, where they built the Stalin museum in his lifetime. At the Soviets' demise, Nikozi became again a center of pilgrimage for Georgians. And as the national church came back to life, Nikozi reacquired a bishop who revived the annual mid-August festivities in honor of St. Rajdeny. The fiercest aerial bombardment of the village took place this year...

Russia’s military intervention in Georgia has provoked a storm of negative reactions in the United States and Europe. To most Americans—and apparently to spluttering Bush administration officials—Moscow’s actions came as an unpleasant surprise. Pundits and policy experts immediately began to speculate about the Kremlin’s motives in Georgia and beyond. To Russophobes the answer is clear: the evil empire has been reborn and is on the march. They issued shrill warnings that Moscow’s dust-up with Georgia was just like the Soviet Union’s invasions of Hungary in 1956 and Czechoslovakia in 1968. Some even invoked the threadbare 1930s analogy, with Russia playing...

Only Russia and the "states" of South Ossetia and Abkhazia will decide how many troops Moscow can keep on their soil, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said Saturday, signaling the Kremlin will do as it pleases in the separatist Georgian regions regardless of Western demands. The statement was in frank defiance of calls by Georgia, the U.S. and the European Union for a withdrawal of most Russian troops from the breakaway territories, which only Russia and Nicaragua have recognized as independent nations. Thumbing its nose at Georgia and the U.S., South Ossetia rolled what Russian media said were captured American-made Jeeps...

William J. Burns, Under Secretary for Political Affairs Statement before the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations Washington, DC September 17, 2008 Mr. Chairman, Senator Lugar, Members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to discuss the Georgia crisis and its implications, particularly for our relationship with Russia. The causes of this conflict – particularly the dispute between Georgia and its breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia – are complex, with mistakes and miscalculations on all sides. But key facts are clear: Russia’s intensified pressure and provocations against Georgia – combined with a serious Georgian miscalculation – have resulted...

Russia cemented its ties with Georgia's two breakaway provinces on Wednesday by signing friendship treaties envisaging close economic and military cooperation. President Dmitry Medvedev pledged that Russia will protect Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which Russia has recognized as two independent nations after the last month's war with Georgia. "Our key task today is to ensure security of Abkhazia and South Ossetia," Medvedev said during an elaborate signing ceremony in the Kremlin. "The treaties envisage that our nations together will take all the necessary steps to fend off threats to peace. We won't allow any new military adventurism, no one must

BRUSSELS, Sept 17 (Reuters) - Georgia will keep pledges to field troops in Western peacekeeping missions in Afghanistan and Iraq despite Russia's crushing of its military during the South Ossetia war, a top official said on Wednesday. "We will still keep our commitments to have our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. That is very important to our country," Georgian national parliament chairman David Bakradze told a news conference in Brussels. "We hope our allies and other friendly countries will help us to recover our infrastructure," he added. Georgia withdrew all of its 2,000 soldiers in Iraq last month after the...

Thus, while Kosovo's status as part of Serbia is unquestionable, South Ossetia and Abkhazia can make a good case they were part of Soviet Georgia but never the current independent state of Georgia. (The same would apply to Transdniestria with respect to Moldova and Nagorno-Karabakh with respect to Azerbaijan. When will they follow suit?) In Kosovo, Washington sowed the wind, and now Georgia has reaped the whirlwind. Only a return to the negotiating table to address comprehensively Kosovo, South Ossetia, Abkhazia and similar trouble spots elsewhere can prevent this malignant precedent from spinning further out of control with incalculable consequences...

The West Begins to Doubt Georgian Leader Five weeks after the war in the Caucasus the mood is shifting against Georgian President Saakashvili. Some Western intelligence reports have undermined Tbilisi's version of events and there are now calls on both sides of the Atlantic for an independent investigation. But now, five weeks after the end of the war in the Caucasus, the winds have shifted in America. Even Washington is beginning to suspect that Saakashvili, a friend and ally, could in fact be a gambler -- someone who triggered the bloody five-day war and then told the West bold-faced lies....

Georgia produced telephone intercepts on Tuesday it said proved Russian armour entered Georgia hours before the start of a Georgian attack that Moscow said forced it to send in its troops. The release of the intercepts comes as both Moscow and Tbilisi wage a diplomatic and public relations campaign to prove the other side fired the first shot in a war that killed hundreds of people and caused widespread devastation. Russia said the evidence was "not serious". The force movements referred to in the intercepts may, it said, have been a routine rotation by Russian peacekeeping forces already operating in...

Georgia has released intercepted telephone calls purporting to show that part of a Russian armored regiment crossed into the separatist enclave of South Ossetia nearly a full day before Georgia’s attack on the capital, Tskhinvali, late on Aug. 7. ... The back and forth over who started the war is already an issue in the American presidential race, with Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska, the Republican vice presidential candidate, contending that Russia’s incursion into Georgia was “unprovoked,” while others argue that Georgia’s shelling of Tskhinvali was provocation. Georgia claims that its main evidence — two of several calls secretly recorded...

14 September 2008 | 13:50 | Source: Tanjug TURIN -- Former Spanish PM Jose Maria Aznar urged Brussels to tread carefully in the Caucasus. "In the case of South Ossetia and Abkhasia, the European Union must not repeat the mistake it made with Kosovo," Aznar said in Turin on Saturday. "The violation of Serbia's territorial integrity on the grounds of ethnic criteria was a serious mistake," Aznar, who heads the Spanish Foundation for Social Studies and Analyses, told an international conference and added that as a result, Russia had been brought into a good position to support the independence of...

A rebel US Republican congressman has sided with Russia in its invasion of and brief war with Georgia, putting himself at odds with the Bush administration and politicians of both parties. "The Russians were right; we're wrong," Rep. Dana Rohrabacher said at a hearing of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee. "The Georgians started it; the Russians ended it," he added. Mr Rohrabacher claimed that unidentified intelligence sources had assured him that Georgia started the fighting that began on August 7 when Georgia's military tried to re-establish control over its breakaway, pro-Russian province of South Ossetia. Russia joined the...

'In the grim present, humanitarian intervention feels like an idea whose time has come and gone," laments Michael Ignatieff in a review-essay in the current issue of The New Republic. Mr. Ignatieff may be right. I regret that being right alarms him. It reassures me. The birth of organizations such as the International Criminal Court (ICC) at a UN-sponsored conference in Rome alarmed me much more 10 years ago. This was around the days when, in Mr Ignatieff's words, "the idea that all states have a 'responsibility to protect' civilians at risk of ethnic cleansing or massacre in other states...

Georgia attack is 'Russia's 9/11' Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has described Georgia's assault on South Ossetia as Russia's 9/11. He said the world had learnt lessons from the attacks in the US on 11 September 2001 and hoped the same would happen after events in the Caucasus. Reports say Russian troops are showing signs of preparing to pull back from inside Georgia. This is in line with a ceasefire deal brokered by French President Nicolas Sarkozy on Monday. However, a Georgian Interior Ministry spokesman cast doubt on the preparations, saying: "There has been no sign of a withdrawal." 'Changed world'...

GROZNY -- Chechen President Ramzan Kadyrov has accused the United States of fomenting unrest in the Caucasus and emboldening Georgia to launch an attack on South Ossetia. Speaking to members of the Valdai Discussion Club at his residence near Grozny, he said Russia's crushing defeat of Georgian troops in their brief war was the appropriate response. Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili "was dancing to someone else's tune," Kadyrov said during the one-hour briefing. "He started a war, an inhuman war. ... The United States was testing Russia through Georgia, and Russia reacted decisively." He backed Moscow's recognition of South Ossetia and...

Russia today slapped down its would-be satellite state of South Ossetia after the leader of the breakaway Georgian province claimed it would become part of the Russian Federation. No sooner had Eduard Kokoity, president of the tiny enclave, alarmed Western powers by announcing it sought to join Russia, than the Kremlin issued a strenous denial and forced him to reverse his statement. South Ossetia was recognised only a few days ago as an independent state by the Kremlin following last month’s bitter war. But Mr Kokoity said this morning that independence was no longer his goal. Instead he told a...

South Ossetia, the breakaway Georgian republic and scene of last month’s bitter war, announced today that it will seek to become part of the Russian Federation. Eduard Kokoity, the President of the tiny enclave which was recognised only a few days ago as an independent state by the Kremlin, said that independence was no longer his goal. Instead he told a group of western journalists and academics that his aim was reuniting Ossetia with its countrymen across the border in North Ossetia, becoming part of Russia. ”We will be part of the Russian Federation,” he said. “It [South Ossetia] is...

South Ossetia May Intend to Join RF South Ossetia intends to become part of Russia, the republic’s president, Eduard Kokoity, told the international Valdai Club. “We do not intend to make an independent Ossetia,” Kokoity said. Rather, he explained, South Ossetia will unite with North Ossetia. Kokoity stated that the West promised to recognize an independent Tskhinvali, if an independent Ossetia was created from the North, which is part of Russia, and the South. “Western experts, political scientists, proposed that we convince North Ossetia to secede from Russia. They promised recognition before Kosovo,” Kokoity said. He did not answer a...

Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president, has hailed a "momentous" breakthrough after securing a pledge from Russia to withdraw its troops from undisputed Georgian territory within a month. President Nicolas Sarkozy in conversation with President Dmitry Medvedev yesterday Although the Kremlin has repeatedly appeared to flout the terms of an earlier ceasefire deal brokered by Mr Sarkozy, the French leader said he was hopeful that this time Russia would keep its word. France is taking a lead role in talks as it currently holds the presidency of the European Union. But even as Mr Sarkozy and his Russian counterpart, Dmitry Medvedev,...

Russia has conditionally agreed to remove its forces from Georgian land - excluding Abkhazia and South Ossetia - by the second week of October. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev said the pull-out would happen once 200 EU monitors deployed to South Ossetia. Speaking after meeting French President Nicolas Sarkozy, Mr Medvedev said the withdrawal was dependent on guarantees that Georgia would not use force again. But he made no mention of withdrawing troops from South Ossetia or Abkhazia. And he defended Russia's controversial decision to recognise the independence of both breakaway regions, saying the move was "irrevocable". Criticism of US Among...

Russia's bait and switch plan using South Ossetia militiamen to goad the Georgian Army into an ill-advised attack and then ride to the rescue of its newly minted Russian citizens, was a masterful operation using all of the tools in the combined arms and services toolbox.  And while there will be no new Cold War, the Russian offensive into Georgia has revealed that despite our individual unit superiority, our military is no longer the global hyper-power as touted by the Pentagon's PR machine.  Russia went into Georgia to accomplish its regional goals simply because Putin realized that a weakened West...

President Dimitri Medvedev has thanked Jordan’s King Abdallah II for offering humanitarian aid to South Ossetia, a separatist region of Georgia where fighting broke out last month. Medvedev held talks with the king at the Black Sea resort of Sochi on August 24 -- their third meeting over the past six months -- to discuss a wide range of issues from the situation in the Middle East to economic cooperation. “I want to separately thank you for your offer of humanitarian aid to South Ossetia following what happened in the region”, Medvedev said at the beginning of the meeting, broadcast...

"What these events show is the collapse of the myth of unity of Orthodox peoples and the collapse of the myth of the supreme peacemaking ability of Orthodox civilization..." .... Georgia has fewer than five million people, but is one of the most ancient Christian countries in the world. Its church dates back to the fourth century, far outpacing the Russian church, which dates its founding to the Baptism of Rus in 988, when Prince Vladimir of Kiev brought Orthodoxy to the banks of the Dnieper River. ... "This is a very complicated and long history of relationship between the...

I was in Tbilisi recently to report on the Russian anschluss into Georgia. You must not expect me to be impartial on the matter. I have visited Georgia four times in as many years and witnessed the country's self-transformation after its Rose Revolution. It went from two centuries of asphyxiating "protection" by Russia, followed by a post-Soviet decade of mafiotic corruption, to a kind of light unto nations under its young president, Mikheil Saakashvili. No doubt all that was provocation enough for Moscow. Even before the war began in early August, the Russians had prevailed on Georgia's Abkhaz and South...

Recognition a Lonely Exercise for Moscow 05 September 2008 By Nabi Abdullaev / Staff Writer Ten days after Russia recognized South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent states, the only other country to have followed suit as of Thursday was that Cold War battlefield of the 1980s: Nicaragua. Nicaraguan President Daniel Ortega's announcement this week of his Central American nation's recognition of the breakaway Georgian regions was a "pleasant surprise," a Foreign Ministry spokesman said Thursday. Closer to home, however, Russia's allies among former Soviet republics have remained reticent on the issue. The Collective Security Treaty Organization, a Russia-led alliance of...

Russia's military and political actions in Abkhazia and South Ossetia are likely to have another unintended consequence: they are likely to make it easier and more attractive for Muslim émigrés from the North Caucasus to return there and change the ethno-religious balance not only in these two republics but in the region more generally. At present, Muslims constitute approximately 35 percent of the populations of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, but both Muslim leaders there and analysts in Moscow say that the new situation which has arisen in the wake of Russia's moves in Georgia is certain to increase that figure,...

Nicaragua has recognized South Ossetia and Abkhazia, backing the Russian stance on the breakaway Georgian regions and siding with other leftist Latin American countries to defy Washington. The Nicaraguan president, Daniel Ortega, a former Marxist guerrilla leader who had close ties to Moscow during the Cold War, has criticized the Georgian attempt to regain control of South Ossetia and supported the counterattack by Russia. Venezuela and Cuba have sided with Russia in the dispute, but Ortega went further in fully recognizing the regions' independence. "The government of Nicaragua recognizes the independence of the republics of South Ossetia and Abkhazia and...

Just weeks after Georgia’s military collapsed in panic in the face of the Russian Army, its leaders hope to rebuild and train its armed forces as if another war with Russia is almost inevitable. Georgia is already drawing up lists of options, including restoring the military to its prewar strength or making it a much larger force with more modern equipment, like air-defense systems, modern antiarmor rockets and night-vision devices. Officials at the Pentagon, State Department and White House confirmed that the Bush administration was examining what would be required to rebuild Georgia’s military, but stressed that no decisions had...

TBILISI, Georgia — Just weeks after Georgia’s military collapsed in panic in the face of the Russian Army, its leaders hope to rebuild and train its armed forces as if another war with Russia is almost inevitable. Georgia is already drawing up lists of options, including restoring the military to its prewar strength or making it a much larger force with more modern equipment, like air-defense systems, modern antiarmor rockets and night-vision devices. Officials at the Pentagon, State Department and White House confirmed that the Bush administration was examining what would be required to rebuild Georgia’s military, but stressed that...

MOSCOW, September 2 (RIA Novosti) - Georgia is mobilizing commando units near its border with South Ossetia, a senior Russian military official said on Tuesday. Russia officially recognized South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent states on August 26, saying the move was needed to protect the regions after Georgia's August 8 attack on South Ossetia. "According to our information, Georgian security forces are trying to restore their [military] presence in Georgian populated villages in South Ossetia. With this aim, Georgia is mobilizing its special forces from the interior and defense ministries near the administrative border with South Ossetia," Col. Gen....

TIRASPOL, Moldova, Aug 31 (Reuters) - Moldova's breakaway region of Transdniestria followed Russia's lead on Sunday by recognising Georgia's breakaway Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent states. But the move is unlikely to ease Russia's diplomatic isolation: Transdniestria itself is not recognised internationally and no state has so far joined Russia in recognising the two Georgian regions.

Russia's president said Sunday his country will give military aid to the two separatist regions at the center of the war with Georgia — signaling Moscow has no intention of backing down in the face of Western pressure.

To be sure, the killing of tens of hundreds of people in the Caucasian region of South Ossetia in a sudden military onslaught by Georgia will turn out to be a landmark event in post-Soviet Russia’s relations with the West. Conceivably, a chapter in the post-Cold War era is ending. Blood has been drawn in the Caucasus, which history shows, is never easy to wipe away. Feuds are known to run for decades even if they bear verisimilitude to family squabbles. The crisis in southern Caucasus was slowly building up ever since Kosovo, the breakaway province of Serbia, declared independence...

[Excerpt]....“So fast forward to early August. You have a town, Tskhinvali, which is Ossetian, and a bunch of Georgian villages surrounding it in a crescent shape. There are peacekeepers there. Both Russian peacekeepers and Georgian peacekeepers under a 1994 accord. The Ossetians were dug in in the town, and the Georgians were in the forests and the fields between the town and the villages. The Ossetians start provoking and provoking and provoking by shelling Georgian positions and Georgian villages around there. And it's a classic tit for tat thing. You shell, I shell back. The Georgians offered repeated ceasefires, which...

The President of Venezuela Hugo Chavez, officially declared Saturday his country's support of Russia and of their decision to recognize South Ossetia's and Abkhazia's independence. With their President's declaration Venezuela became the second country to officially recognize South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Belarus is the other one - they declared earlier their support of the decision of the Russian government. "We support Russia. Russia has all the right to defend their own interest," Chavez said in a televised statement.

Russia warned that Kosovo's independence would create a dangerous precedent. Georgia shows how it did. In February, with U.S. backing, Kosovo declared its independence—nine years after NATO went to war to end Serbia's thuggish behavior in the province. Shortly after Kosovo hoisted its new national flag, Russia, Serbia's patron, warned (in the words of its foreign minister) that the theory of secession used to strip away Kosovo had "created a precedent" applicable elsewhere. Now, in the aftermath of Russia's invasion of Georgia—supposedly for the protection of separatists in Abkhazia and South Ossetia—it's a good time to pause and ask, was...

Chairman of the Central Muslim Board of Russia, Supreme Mufti, Sheikh ul-Islam Talgat Tajuddin addressed regional Muslim boards and believers appealing for them to render necessary help and support to the people of South Ossetia and all those who suffered from the humanitarian catastrophe in the territory of this republic. REGNUM correspondent reports referring to the Central Muslim Board's press office. The Supreme Mufti of Russia has also called on the whole Muslim world to recognize independence of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. ''Russian Muslims, like all our compatriots, support decision of the Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on recognition of independence...

Tony Halpin in Moscow The Kremlin moved swiftly to tighten its grip on Georgia’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 province’s Deputy Speaker of parliament, announced that South Ossetia would be absorbed into Russia soon so that its people could live in “one united Russian state” with their ethnic kin in North Ossetia.

Spiegel: OSCE observers fault Georgians in conflict Europe News Aug 30, 2008, 9:52 GMT Hamburg - European observers have faulted Georgia in this month's Caucasus conflict, saying it made elaborate plans to seize South Ossetia, according to the German news magazine Der Spiegel on Saturday. In a report to appear in its Monday edition, it said officials of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) had said acts by the Georgian government had contributed to the outbreak of the crisis with Russia. Spiegel said OSCE military observers in the Caucasus had described preparations by Georgia to move into...

"The 'entente cordiale' did not work," Russia's NATO ambassador Dmitry Rogozin has said, referring to accords between Britain and France signed in the early 20th century that put a line under centuries of hostility and conflict. "Relations should now be pragmatic," he said. "The good performance of our army in Ossetia has already impressed our partners," he added. "We should do everything to uphold this impression and end once and forever any temptation by our partners to resolve any problems by force.."

Major Malkhaz Dumbatze was in a celebratory mood. His 14 Georgian tanks had just taken control of the rebel South Ossetian capital, Tskhinvali, and he was already looking forward to a trip to Israel to study new battle command systems. The jets flying over the city, where his men were mopping up Ossetian snipers, he took to be Georgian fighters. Major Dumbatze is still going to Israel, but now it is to have reconstruction surgery on his legs. The aircraft he had spotted were in fact Russian, and one of them dropped two bombs on his armoured unit. Speaking with...

AUGUST 29, 2008 Ethnic cleansing of Georgians in the now seperated Provinces of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, which Russia has officially recognized as indepenednet, is now proceedingat a rapid pace. Georgian homes and villages are being burned and raised and Georgian civilians are being forced to leave...many with nothing but what they can wear and carry, if that. Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili announced that Georgia was officially breaking diplomatic ties with Russia, ordering its diplomats and staff to leave Moscow and return to Georgia. The action comes as a direct Georgian response to Moscows recognition of its two Provinces...

The Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) released date on deployment of the Russian military on various locations on the Georgian territory as of August 27. “All locations and numbers given here are double-checked,” the ministry said. “MIA could not verify all information available and the actual number of both Russian military equipment and personnel on the ground may be much higher.” Below is the data as provided by the Georgian MIA: Locations of the Russian illegal check-points in the Eastern Georgia, including Shida Kartli, other adjacent areas of “South Ossetia” and “South Ossetia” itself according to the MIA sources...

Georgia's breakaway region of South Ossetia has signalled that it will formally seek to merge with Russia. This move would amount to Russia’s annexation of an area of another state and the redrawing of the map of a corner of Europe. South Ossetia, with a largely Russian population of only 70,000, has no viable future as an independent state and observers believe that its only realistic option is to join its giant neighbour. President Dmitry Medvedev of Russia discussed this option with his South Ossetian counterpart, Eduard Kokoity, earlier this week during a meeting in Moscow. Znaur Gassiyev, the Speaker...

A Georgian Foreign Ministry official said Friday Georgia is to recall all diplomatic staff from its embassy in Moscow because of the Russian military presence in Georgia. Nato Chikovani says Georgia will withdraw its staff on Saturday, following a parliamentary vote in favor of the move on Thursday. Russian news agencies cite Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrei Nestrenko as criticizing the move, saying it will not benefit bilateral relations. Georgia is angry at the lingering presence of Russian troops in Georgia despite Russia's promise to withdraw in accordance with an EU-brokered cease-fire. Also on Friday, officials in South Ossetia said...

Russia and South Ossetia will sign a military agreement next week allowing Russia to set up a military base in the breakaway region, Tarzan Kokoity, the acting vice-speaker of the South Ossetian parliament, said on August 29. He said that the agreement was expected to be signed on September 2, Interfax news agency reported. Interfax quoted an unnamed “military-diplomatic source” in Moscow as saying that Russia was planning to establish three military bases in Abkhazia and South Ossetia. In particular, he said, the plan envisaged bases in Gudauta and Ochamchire in Abkhazia. Georgia has long claimed that the Gudauta military...

Russian-backed paramilitaries are “ethnically cleansing” villages on Georgian soil, refugees and officials told The Times yesterday. South Ossetian militiamen have torched houses, beaten elderly people and even murdered civilians in the lawless buffer zone set up by the Russian Army just north of Gori. The violence, close to the border with the breakaway republic recognised by Russia this week as independent, has prompted a new wave of refugees into Gori, 40 miles north of Tbilisi. People who had started to return to their villages in the area are now fleeing for a second time, joined by many elderly people who...

Fears are mounting that Russia may restrict oil deliveries to Western Europe over coming days, in response to the threat of EU sanctions and Nato naval actions in the Black Sea. Any such move would be a dramatic escalation of the Georgia crisis and play havoc with the oil markets. Reports have begun to circulate in Moscow that Russian oil companies are under orders from the Kremlin to prepare for a supply cut to Germany and Poland through the Druzhba (Friendship) pipeline. It is believed that executives from lead-producer LUKoil have been put on weekend alert. "They have been told...

AFTER barely 100 days in office, the soft-spoken Dmitry Medvedev, Russia’s president, has been cast in the unlikely role of war leader. His initial job appeared to be as Vladimir Putin’s spokesman. But he quickly got a taste for war. On Tuesday August 26th he stood beneath the two-headed Russian eagle and solemnly announced the Kremlin’s decision to recognise the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. The decision, Mr Medvedev argued, was forced on him by Georgia’s “genocide” against South Ossetia. But the argument is spurious. It is true that, in the early 1990s, when Georgia was barely a state,...