MOSCOW // The Russian president Dmitry Medvedev ordered a halt to military action in Georgia today, after five days of air and land attacks that took Russian forces halfway across the small Western-allied nation. Mr Medvedev said on national television that the military had punished Georgia enough for its attack on South Ossetia. Georgia launched an offensive late on Thursday to regain control over the separatist Georgian province, which has close ties to Russia. "The security of our peacekeepers and civilians has been restored," Mr Medvedev said. "The aggressor has been punished and suffered very significant losses. Its military has been disorganised." The Russian president, however, said he ordered the military to defend itself and quell any signs of Georgian resistance. "If there are any emerging hotbeds of resistance or any aggressive actions, you should take steps to destroy them," he told his defence minister at a televised Kremlin meeting. Hours before Mr Medvedev's announcement, Russian forces bombed the town of Gori and launched an offensive in the only part of Abkhazia still under Georgian control, tightening the assault on the beleaguered nation as the French president Nicolas Sarkozy flew to Moscow carrying Western demands that Russia pull back. The UN and Nato called meetings to deal with a conflict that blew up in the pro-Russian separatist South Ossetia region last week and quickly developed into an East-West crisis that raised fears in the former Soviet bloc nations of Eastern Europe. Five European presidents were headed to Russia and Georgia to mediate.
Michal Thim, an analyst at the Association for International Affairs in Prague, said: "We have to wait and see if this is implemented. Russia militarily and politically achieved what it wanted. "In all that time, apart from some verbal criticism, it has not met any sharp or fundamental reaction from the United States nor Europe. "The EU council of ministers is only meeting tomorrow and it was Russia's interest to put them in front of a final state of affairs which they seem to have achieved.
"It would be tactically disadvantageous for Russia to continue in its actions during that meeting given that they had achieved what they wanted. "The attacks on the territory of Georgia and the military action outside the areas of conflict discredited Russia and I cannot see how Russia wants to defend the role of an arbiter, a neutral player in those conflicts. "EU ministers should agree on changing the negotiating formats for the conflicts in Ossetia and Abkhazia. The role of Russia can no longer be that of an arbiter of these conflicts."
* With agencies