TBILISI, Georgia -- The EU monitors began patrols today in some areas of a buffer zone around Georgia's two separatist provinces, South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
Russia had said yesterday that it would not allow the unarmed monitors into the buffer zone - a four-mile wide zone around the provinces set up under the French-brokered ceasefire agreement. However, the AP reports monitors have entered at some checkpoints.
Russian troops are supposed to pull out of territory controlled by Georgia before August's war by October 10.
As the deadline approaches tensions have been growing between Russia and Georgia over the past weeks. Georgia's Interior Ministry reports an unmanned aerial drone crashed inside Georgian territory on Tuesday. A Georgian policeman was killed and three injured in a firefight along the Abkhaz border on Sunday, September 21. In a separate incident that same day two policeman were injured by a mine blast in the same area.
Russia had said yesterday that it would not allow the unarmed monitors into the buffer zone - a four-mile wide zone around the provinces set up under the French-brokered ceasefire agreement. However, the AP reports monitors have entered at some checkpoints.
Russian troops are supposed to pull out of territory controlled by Georgia before August's war by October 10.
As the deadline approaches tensions have been growing between Russia and Georgia over the past weeks. Georgia's Interior Ministry reports an unmanned aerial drone crashed inside Georgian territory on Tuesday. A Georgian policeman was killed and three injured in a firefight along the Abkhaz border on Sunday, September 21. In a separate incident that same day two policeman were injured by a mine blast in the same area.
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