Russian peace-makers, detained by Georgian police in the city of Zugdidi, were released after being examined in a local police station. Wednesday morning the four soldiers were passed to the representative of the Collective Forces on Peace Maintaining in the zone of Georgian-Abkhazian conflict, Vladimir Rogozin. 

A day before, at about 8:30 p.m. the Georgian police stopped the Ural truck carrying a military cargo to a peace-maker’ base situated in the village of Urta in Zugdidi district. The accompanying soldiers were disarmed with the use of force and brought to the police station, while the vehicle and the cargo got confiscated.  

Georgian MVD representatives say that the peace-makers have been transporting some weapons not allowed with their mandate. “Detention of the Russian peace-makers was done due to lack of correspondence of the data pointed in the documents to the real cargo. There were weapons in the truck including a few units of guided missiles. It’s not clear for us why Russian peace-makers need guided missiles in the zone of the conflict” commented on the incident Shota Utiashvili, the head of analytical department of Georgian interior ministry. It is reported that a criminal case has been started on the count of bringing 35 boxes filled with guided anti-tank missiles into Zugdidi district. Interior ministry says it had had preliminary operative information about unauthorized transporting the weapons.   

Vladimir Rogozin admitted the detained vehicle to have carried the anti-tank guided missiles on board. At the same time he stated that the Georgian side must return the confiscated property.  

“Russian militaries made an attempt of making something like a base on the territory of their staff in the village of Urta, but we shall not allow that even if a special paratroopers unit will be accompanying it” said the chief of the staff of peace-maker’s operations at the Georgian defense ministry, Kurashvili. 

The incident gave an occasion to Georgian politics to speak about groundlessness of the peace-making format standing in Abkhazia and necessity of replacing the peace-maker’s forces.