South Ossetia says Russia intends to absorb region

[August 29, 2008]  TSKHINVALI, Georgia (AP) -- Russia intends to eventually absorb Georgia's breakaway province of South Ossetia, a South Ossetian official said Friday, three days after Moscow recognized the region as independent and drew criticism from the West.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and the region's leader, Eduard Kokoity, discussed the future of South Ossetia earlier this week in Moscow, South Ossetian parliamentary speaker Znaur Gassiyev said.

Russia will absorb South Ossetia "in several years" or earlier, a position was "firmly stated by both leaders," Gassiyev said.

In Moscow, a Kremlin spokeswoman said Friday there was "no official information" on the talks.

In Georgia, the vice speaker of parliament, Gigi Tsereteli, said the statement cannot be taken seriously.

"The separatist regimes of Abkhazia and South Ossetia and the Russian authorities are cut off from reality," he said in Tbilisi. "The world has already become different and Russia will not long be able to occupy sovereign Georgian territory."

"The regimes of Abkhazia and South Ossetia should think about the fact that if they become part of Russia, they will be assimilated and in this way they will disappear," he added.

Moscow's recognition Tuesday of South Ossetia and another separatist province, Abkhazia, came on the back of a short war that began Aug. 7, when Georgia launched a military offensive to retake South Ossetia. Russia responded by rolling hundreds of tanks into the Moscow-friendly province and pushed the Georgian army out.

Russia blasted the offensive as blind aggression, saying the move deprived Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili of the moral authority to defend Georgia's territorial integrity.

Georgia and the West in turn criticized Russia for pressing further into Georgia proper and for ignoring a cease-fire brokered by the European Union.

Meanwhile, Russia and South Ossetia plan to sign an agreement on the placement of Russian military bases in South Ossetia, the province's deputy parliamentary speaker Tarzan Kokoiti said. How many bases that involves will become clear on Sept. 2, when the document is set to be signed, he said.

He said South Ossetians have the right to reunite with North Ossetia, which is part of Russia.

"Soon there will be no North or South Ossetia -- there will be a united Alania as part of Russia," Kokoiti said, using another name for Ossetia.

"We will live in one united Russian state," he said.

[Associated Press; By YURAS KARMANAU]

Associated Press writers Misha Dzhindhzikhashvili and Jim Heintz in Tbilisi, Georgia; and David Nowak and Maria Danilova in Moscow contributed to this report.

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