September 11, 2008	Thursday	Ramazan 10, 1429

MOSCOW, Sept 10: Russia ruled out on Wednesday allowing EU observers into the Georgian regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, contradicting claims by French President Nicolas Sarkozy over the mission.

Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov threw into doubt the remit of the EU mission just two days after Sarkozy brokered the deployment of 200 observers to monitor a complete Russian withdrawal from Georgian territory outside the rebel regions.

“Additional international observers will be deployed precisely around South Ossetia and Abkhazia and not inside these republics,” Lavrov told journalists in Moscow.

Sarkozy said on Monday -- when he went to Moscow and Tbilisi to shore up the terms of a deal that halted last month’s Russia-Georgia war -- that the observers would have wider powers.

“The spirit of the text is that they (the EU observers) will have a mandate to enter (Abkhazia and South Ossetia), to observe, to report,” Sarkozy said in Tbilisi alongside Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili.

The latest deal requires Russia to withdraw all its troops from Georgia -- outside of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, which Moscow considers to be independent countries -- within 10 days of the EU deployment on October 1.

Experts say ambiguity over where the EU team might go has been the key weakness in the deal, with some saying the bloc could be accused of consolidating Russia’s hold over the regions by not deploying there..—AFP