Not Quite Over Yet

By BJ

This morning brings conflicting reports that the Russian military is in the Georgian city of Gori, though there doesn't appear to have been any fighting overnight.

Georgia's president accused Russia of sending 50 tanks into the central Georgian city of Gori on Wednesday despite an agreed-upon ceasefire calling on both sides to retreat to positions they held before fighting began six days ago.

"As I speak, the Russian tanks are attacking the town of Gori and are rampaging through the town," Saakashvili told reporters during a press conference in the Georgian capital Tbilisi. "There is marauding. There is destruction of buildings."

Reuters, with a corespondent in the area, has a somewhat different take:

Meanwhile, Georgia accused Russia of sending dozens of tanks on Wednesday into the Georgian town of Gori, 25 km (15 miles) south of Tskhinvali.

Moscow strongly denied the claim and a witness in the town, the birthplace of Soviet leader Josef Stalin, told Reuters no Russian military could be seen. "I've been all over town. No tanks. No Russians," he said.

Witnesses said Russian forces had in fact set up two checkpoints on the outskirts of Gori and had occupied an abandoned Georgian artillery base 4-5 km (2-3 miles) from Gori town centre.

The reports of looting I find much more credible given the Georgian authorities completely abandoned the area, resulting in a power vacuum, and looting and anarchy are pretty much standard fare in such cases.

And on the Abhkazia front:

The self-styled president of Abkhazia, Sergei Bagapsh, said on Wednesday that the region's forces had pushed out Georgian troops and captured the disputed upper reaches of the Kodori Gorge on the region's boundary with Georgia proper.

That was a major blow to Tbilisi, since the gorge was the only significant portion of Abkhaz territory under its control.

Blow to Tbilisi or not, this actually bodes somewhat better for the cease-fire holding, since the continued dispute over that area could easily have re-ignited the fighting elsewhere.

In any case, tensions remain quite high, and Saakashvili certainly hasn't tempered his rhetoric. If anything, it seems to have gotten worse the moment the Russian guns stopped firing, but it doesn't look like either government really wants to start things up again. Whether some of their subordinates or proxies do is another matter, but the longer the cease-fire holds, the less likely it is that it will be broken.

Wait and see.