BIG POWERS URGE RUSSIA TO ACCEPT TRUCE
By Matthew Lee

Associated Press
Monday August 11 2008

WASHINGTON (AP) – The world’s seven largest economic powers on Monday
urged Russia to accept an immediate cease-fire with Georgia and agree
to mediation over the crisis as Russian forces continued advances
into Georgian territory.

With conditions deteriorating despite similar repeated calls, Secretary
of State Condoleezza Rice and her colleagues from the Group of Seven
leading industrialized nations pledged their support for a negotiated
solution to the conflict that has been raging since Friday between
the former Soviet republic and Russia, the State Department said.

"We want to see the Russians stand down," deputy spokesman Robert
Wood told reporters. "What we’re calling on is for Russia to stop
its aggression."

President Bush has criticized the violence, calling it unacceptable
and that Russia’s response was disproportionate. Bush planned to
make a statement about Georgia on Monday evening at the White House,
shortly after arriving back in Washington from Beijing where he was
attending the Olympics, the White House said.

Ahead of that, Rice and the foreign ministers of Britain, Canada,
France, Germany, Italy and Japan spoke in a conference call, during
which they noted that Georgia had agreed to a cease-fire and wanted
to see Russia sign on immediately, he said, adding that the call was
one of more than 90 that Rice has made on the matter since Friday.

They called on Russia to respect Georgia’s borders and expressed deep
concern for civilian casualties that have occurred and noted that
Georgia had agreed to a cease-fire and said the ministers wanted to
see Russia sign on immediately as urgent consultations at the United
Nations and NATO were expected, according to Wood.

The seven ministers also backed a nascent mediation efforts led by
French Foreign Minister Bernard Kouchner, whose country currently
holds the rotating presidency of the European Union, and Finnish
Foreign Minister Alexander Stubb, whose country now holds the chair
of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, he said.

The Group of Seven, or G7, is often expanded into what is known as
the G8, a grouping that includes Russia, but Russia’s Foreign Minister
Sergey Lavrov was notably not included in the call.

Wood said the United States was hopeful that the U.N. Security Council
would pass a "strong" resolution on the fighting that called for an
end to attacks on both sides as well as mediation but prospects for
such a statement were dim given that Russia wields a veto on the
15-member body.

A U.S. senior U.S. diplomat, Matthew Bryza, is now in Tbilisi and
working with Georgian and European officials there on ways to calm
the situation.

Bryza plans to stay in Georgia for several days and doesn’t plan to
travel elsewhere, according to Wood.

Meanwhile, the State Department said it has evacuated more than 170
American citizens from Georgia. Wood said two convoys carrying about
170 private U.S. citizens along with a number of family members of
U.S. diplomats based in Georgia left Tbilisi on Sunday and Monday
for neighboring Armenia.

The U.S. Embassy in Georgia has distributed an initial contribution
of $250,000 in humanitarian relief to victims of the fighting and
is providing emergency equipment to people in need, although those
supplies will run out later Monday, the department said.

The developments came as swarms of Russian jets launched new raids
on Georgian territory outside the initial conflict point of South
Ossetia and Georgia faced the threat of a second front of fighting
with Russia demanding that it disarm troops near the breakaway province
of Abkhazia.

The Pentagon said it had finished flying some 2,000 Georgian troops
back home from Iraq on C-17 aircraft at Georgia’s request.

It said it had informed the Russians about the flights before they
began in order to avoid any mishaps, but Russian Prime Minister
Vladimir Putin harshly criticized the step, saying it would hamper
efforts to resolve the situation by reinforcing Georgian assets in a
"conflict zone."

Wood rejected the criticism, saying: "We’re not assisting in any
conflict."

Defense Department spokesman Bryan Whitman said the U.S. flew the
Georgians out of Iraq as part of a prior agreement that transport
would be provided in case of an emergency.

Pentagon officials said Monday that U.S. military was assessing the
fighting every day to determine whether less than 100 U.S. trainers
should be pulled out of the country.

There had been about 130 trainers, including a few dozen civilian
contractors, but the civilians had been scheduled to rotate out of
the country and did so over the weekend, Whitman said. The remaining
uniformed trainers were moved over the weekend to what officials
believe is a safer location, he said.

Whitman said Defense Secretary Robert Gates had spoken in the last few
days to both his Georgian and Russian counterparts, but he declined to
say what they discussed. He said Gates also spoke twice to Georgia’s
president – both times about U.S. help in getting the Georgian troops
back to their country.

The conflict began there on Thursday when Georgia tried to regain
control of the breakaway region. The United States recognizes it
as part of Georgia but it has been under de facto Russian control
for years.