Word: ossetians
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...rapprochement between warring parties seems unlikely. In a brief telephone interview, South Ossetian leader Eduard Kokoity called Saakashvili "psychologically unbalanced," "unstable" and a "liar." For his part, Saakashvili seems to like to taunt Putin, now Prime Minister of Russia. ("Putin pledged solemnly to hang me by the balls. He couldn't succeed in that," he says.) The Russians refuse to speak to Saakashvili at all. They continue to accuse him of genocide, a dubious description for a conflict that resulted in 358 South Ossetian deaths...
...inquiry says the conflict started the moment Georgia shelled the South Ossetian capital of Tskhinvali on the night of Aug. 7-8, 2008. "In the mission's view, it was Georgia which triggered off the war when it attacked Tskhinvali with heavy artillery," Tagliavini said in a statement accompanying the report. The document condemns the bombing, saying it was an overly aggressive response to the provocation. "It is not possible to accept that the shelling of Tskhinvali ... would satisfy the requirements of having been necessary and proportionate in order to defend those villages," it says...
...Russia received its fair share of blame. The attack by Georgia was "the culminating point of a long period of increasing tensions, provocations and incidents," the report says. In the run-up to the war, Russia issued passports to South Ossetian citizens, which the investigators say "runs against the principles of good neighborliness and constitutes an open challenge to Georgian sovereignty and an interference in the internal affairs of Georgia." More ominously, the report notes that there seemed to be an "influx of volunteers or mercenaries" from Russia to South Ossetia in early August 2008. (See pictures of the Russians...
...inquiry rejects outright the Russian allegations that Georgia had carried out a genocide against the South Ossetian population, but it accepts Tbilisi's charges that ethnic cleansing took place against Georgians driven from South Ossetia in the conflict...
...Mamuka Zenashvili, an ethnic Georgian who continues to live in Tskhinvali with his South Ossetian wife Nino, says he does not believe the border will be opened soon. But he has seen signs that, one day, people may be able to move on from the war. "People just want to visit family and friends and trade," he says, looking out over a neighborhood that was nearly leveled by the fighting last year. "My neighbors have enough of their own problems to not dwell on my last name. Sometimes they even come over to ask if they can help repair...