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War in Georgia could be just around the corner

As he sips coffee at an outdoor cafe in the capital of the Georgian breakaway republic of South Ossetia, Roland Kelekshayev describes how he keeps an AK-47 automatic rifle in his home, oiled and ready for use.

"If necessary, not just I but the whole of our people will stand up and fight," said the 32-year-old Ossetian. "Either we will exist as a nation or they will wipe us from the face of the earth."

This tiny territory of 70,000 people nestling on the southern slopes of the Caucasus mountains is preparing for war.

South Ossetia has enjoyed de facto independence from Georgia since fighting a separatist war in the early 1990s but in the past few weeks, the uneasy truce which followed that conflict has started to unravel. Almost nightly, Georgian and South Ossetian troops exchange gunfire. In the latest flare-up last week, several servicemen on both sides were reported to have been wounded after a night-long gun battle.

When they are not shooting at each other, Georgian and South Ossetian forces man roadblocks and unceremoniously arrest anyone who arouses suspicion.

So far, no one has been killed. Both sides say they want a peaceful solution. But in this tinderbox atmosphere, many fear that it is just a matter of time before full-scale hostilities break out.

"This is the prologue to a war which would make Chechnya look small," Znaur Gassiyev, speaker of South Ossetia's separatist parliament, said in Tskhinvali.

If that happens, the repercussions will reach far beyond this obscure corner of Europe. South Ossetia's separatists are backed -- tacitly at least -- by Russia while Georgia's receive military assistance from the US and UK.

"Everyone will get dragged in," predicted the speaker.

For Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili, his country's territorial integrity is at stake.

The 36-year-old former New York lawyer has said he will not allow a separatist regime in the heart of Georgia: Tskhinvali lies just 85km from the capital, Tbilisi.

Saakashvili claims South Ossetia is little more than a smuggling racket, making fat profits bringing in contraband from Russia.

"People are telling us that the Georgian flag cannot be raised in the ... middle of Georgia," Saakashvili said recently. "We are ready to fight like mad for the restoration of our territorial integrity."
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