Georgia on Monday accused a Russian agent of organising a car bombing that killed three policemen and seriously injured 15 people in February Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili did not say why Russia would want to attack its ex-Soviet neighbour, but Georgian officials at the time said the blast was designed to derail peace talks with the rebel South Ossetia region.
"The interior ministry has solved this terrorist act, and detained suspects," Merabishvili told reporters in Gori, scene of the car bombing which wrecked a police station and scattered body parts across the street.
"We ascertained that a Russian GRU (military intelligence) colonel... set up a sabotage squad a year and a half ago, which was trained on Russian territory... this group committed a series of terrorist acts."
Ties between Moscow and Tbilisi have been strained since the end of the Soviet Union.
Georgia accuses Russia of undermining its sovereignty by backing separatists in breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, while Russia has blamed Georgia for failing to stop Chechen rebels from crossing its territory.
Merabishvili said the guerrillas who attacked Gori had been detained near Tskhinvali - capital of South Ossetia which broke away from Tbilisi's rule in a brief 1992 war - and that he had met the Russian ambassador to discuss the attacks.
"I hope the Russian side will hand over all people suspected of taking part in these terrorist acts," he said.
GRU and defence ministry officials were not available for comment, but Itar-Tass news agency quoted a source in the armed forces' general staff as denying any involvement.
"The head of the Georgian interior ministry's statement.. does not correspond to the facts. It is just an attempt to provoke a reaction, reflecting Tbilisi's generally unfriendly opinion of Moscow," Tass quoted its source as saying.
Russian agents have fallen foul of foreign justice before. Two spies were imprisoned in Qatar in June last year for organising the car bomb that killed a prominent Chechen separatist leader in the Gulf State.
Comments
Comments are closed.