GERMANY OFFERS TO EVACUATE EU CITIZENS IN GEORGIA

Deutsche Welle
11.08.2008

GroÃ~_ansicht des Bildes mit der Bildunterschrift: Residential areas
have been damaged in the fighting The German embassy has organized
busses to to transport citizens out of Georgia. The German emgassy
reports that 200 have already left due to the fighting and another
100 are expected to leave by late Monday, Aug. 11.

The bus is headed for the Armenian capital Yerevan, the German foreign
ministry said. The German embassy emphasized that the citizens are
not being "evacuated" but are leaving the country voluntarily.

Some 300 German citizens are still in Georgia. They are being contacted
and offered the chance to leave if they wish, ministry spokesman Jens
Ploetner told a news conference Monday.

Ploetner said that the German embassy in Tbilisi was also prepared
to help citizens from other European countries.

Germans in Georgia told to contact embassy

"There is no reason for panic but we are calling on all German
citizens… to contact the embassy," he said.

Russia has bombed radars near the Georgian capital of Tbilisi and
has hit residential areas in the Georgian city of Gori near the South
Ossetian border. The United Nations refugee agency said that nearly
80 percent of Gori’s 50,000 residents have fled due to the bombings.

Merkel urges end to violence

German Chancellor Angela Merkel repeated her call for an end to
the violence in a Monday morning phone conversation with Georgian
President Mikheil Saakashvili, her spokesman Thomas Steg said.

Merkel also gave her full support to French President Nicolas Sarkozy,
who plans to travel to Moscow, Steg added. France currently holds
the European Union’s rotating presidency.

Merkel said it was "essential that there is an immediate and
non-conditional ceasefire and for all armed forces to withdraw to
the positions held before the conflict" and that "the territorial
integrity of Georgia should be respected," Steg said.

Merkel plans to meet with Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Friday,
but said that the meeting will entirely focus on the current conflict.

German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier has also spoken
several times by phone with his Russian and Georgian counterparts,
and also took part in a conference call on Sunday with other EU
foreign ministers, Ploetner said.

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