Word: russian
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Reluctantly, almost insolently, on Aug. 16, Russia said it would withdraw its tanks and troops from the parts of Georgia it had overrun so swiftly just a few days before. Under the cease-fire agreement, Russian columns are expected to pull back behind preconflict lines of control. But amid reports of further incursions into Georgia, Russia is taking its own sweet time in complying. With tanks still rumbling along roads lined with ruins, the status quo in this part of the Caucasus is gone for good, crushed by the force of arms...
...human and physical damage is daunting enough. Hundreds of people have been killed, villages razed, bridges buckled and blown up, railways cut. Days after the cease-fire was agreed, the Russian army was still destroying military and civilian targets; the Georgian government accused it of inexplicably setting fire to vast tracts of woodland. In South Ossetia, the looting and deliberate destruction of ethnic Georgian villages mean that the two populations - Georgian and Ossetian - will not any time soon live side by side, as they had for centuries...
...political impact of the fighting is far-reaching. Russia has vowed that its troops will continue to occupy slices of Georgian territory even after its supposed withdrawal, acting as "peacekeepers" in the self-styled autonomous regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Georgia can "forget about" its territorial integrity, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said...
...BELARUS 2. UKRAINE 3. MOLDOVA Russia has held a grudge against Ukraine since the 2004 pro-democracy Orange Revolution. Belarus has kept particularly close ties with Moscow, while Russian troops are currently stationed in a semidetached Moldovan territory...
...GEORGIA 2. ARMENIA 3. AZERBAIJAN A vital region for the West, which has high hopes for an oil pipeline through Azerbaijan. George W. Bush visited ally Mikheil Saakashvili in Georgia in 2005. Tiny Armenia, which borders Turkey and Iran, readily accepts Russian protection...