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South Ossetia strengthening its border with Georgia

South Ossetia's president accused Georgian authorities of staging provocations near the border

South Ossetian President Leonid Tibilov Stanislav Krasilnikov/TASS

South Ossetian President Leonid Tibilov

© Stanislav Krasilnikov/TASS

TSKHINVAL, July 20. /TASS/. South Ossetia will continue enhancing its state border with Georgia, President Leonid Tibilov said on Monday.

"We will continue to strengthen and technically equip the territory along the South Ossetian border [with Georgia]," he stressed adding that Georgia carried out several provocations near the border with South Ossetia.

"Such illegal actions by the Georgian authorities prove once again that Georgian leaders still cannot accept the fact that South Ossetia - an independent sovereign country - has its own state borders," Tibilov said. "It was a rather good undertaking by the Georgian authorities, taking into account European Council President Donald Tusk’s planned visit to Georgia. Georgia wanted to take him to the border area with clearly provocative aims," he added.

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South Ossetia informed mediators about the border situation at Geneva discussions. Today, an emergency meeting is held in the framework of the Mechanism for prevention and reacting to incidents. Tibilov noted that Georgia and international mediators were notified beforehand about works to strengthen the South Ossetian border in the framework of Geneva Discussions on Security and Stability in Transcaucasia. However, Tbilisi tries to approach the situation in the border region from the point of view of its relations with Russia.

"I want to stress that the Russian government has nothing to do with the incident in Georgia. South Ossetia is really working and intends to continue working on strengthening its border with the country with which it has no relations," Tibilov said.

In March, Russia and South Ossetia signed a Treaty on Alliance and Integration. The Treaty envisages joint defense and security, free movement across the Russian-South Ossetian border, customs integration, cooperation between law-enforcement agencies, simplified procedures for obtaining Russian citizenship and social aspects, including pension payments.

Russia will ensure defense and security of South Ossetia and protect the country’s borders, according to the treaty. The treaty envisages forming a common defense and security space between Russia and South Ossetia, as well as free border crossing between Russia and South Ossetia, taking into account restrictions in place for security concerns.

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