MOSCOW, Oct 4: A senior Russian peacekeeping officer was among seven soldiers killed on Friday in an explosion in Georgia’s breakaway region of South Ossetia, Russian media reported on Saturday.

On Friday, seven Russian peacekeepers died and another seven were wounded when a car filled with explosives blew up near their base in Tskhinvali, the South Ossetian capital, news agencies reported.

RIA Novosti on Saturday quoted a representative of Russia’s Ground Force as saying Colonel Ivan Petrik, the Russian peacekeepers’ chief of staff, was killed in that blast. He was in his office when the explosion went off near the building.

“Petrik was severely wounded by the blast wave and died at the explosion site,” RIA quoted the official as saying.

South Ossetian leader Eduard Kokoity on Friday blamed Georgian security services for the blast. The Georgian Interior Ministry denied the charges.

Months of skirmishes between separatists and Georgian troops erupted into war in August when Georgia sent troops and tanks to retake the pro-Russian region of South Ossetia, which threw off Georgian rule in the early 1990s.—Reuters