MOSCOW (AFP) — The head of Georgia's breakaway South Ossetia region on Tuesday called for talks with Tbilisi to defuse mounting tensions over the Moscow-backed region, Russia's ITAR-TASS news agency reported.
South Ossetia "is extending a hand of friendship, calling on Georgia to forget about aggression and sit down at the negotiating table," the news agency quoted South Ossetian president Eduard Kokoity as saying.
Tensions in the region soared last week after separatists said two people were killed by intense shelling from Georgia and threatened to retaliate with heavy weapons.
On Tuesday separatists briefly detained four Georgian servicemen, prompting an angry reaction from the Georgian government in Tbilisi.
EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana on Tuesday said he was "seriously concerned" about the deteriorating situation in South Ossetia and the fellow breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia.
Also Tuesday, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice accused Russia of "adding to tension in the region" through its support of the rebels.
South Ossetia broke away from the rest of Georgia in the early 1990s in a conflict that killed several thousand people.
With backing from Russia, the territory, home to some 70,000 people, has existed as a de facto independent statelet since then.
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