Georgia policeman shot dead 

Source:

A Georgian police officer was shot dead near the de facto border with breakaway South Ossetia, the Georgian Interior Ministry said, blaming sniper fire from territory "occupied" by Russian forces.

South Ossetia denied involvement.

Georgian police said the officer was the 11th to be killed in the South Ossetia and Abkhazia border areas since Georgia and Russia fought a five-day war in August and Georgian security forces quit both regions.

The incident happened in the village of Knolevi on South Ossetia's southwestern boundary. South Ossetian authorities said their nearest security forces were 4-5 kilometres from Knolevi and even with a sniper rifle could not possibly have shot the officer.

"Such a weapon simply does not exist," the South Ossetian defence ministry press service said in a statement.

The Georgian Interior Ministry said the officer was killed "as a result of shots fired from occupied territory."

"According to preliminary information, the shots were fired from a sniper rifle," it said in a statement.

Russia drove Georgian forces from South Ossetia in August, repelling a Georgian assault to retake the pro-Russian region which threw off Tbilisi's rule in the early 1990s.

Moscow has since recognised South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent states, secured by thousands of Russian troops.

More than 200 European Union monitors are observing the fragile ceasefire, strained by frequent accusations of shooting from both sides of the boundary. They do not have access to South Ossetia.

The EU mission condemned the shooting.

"We expect this incident to be thoroughly investigated on both sides of the South Ossetian Administrative Boundary Line and those responsible duly prosecuted," it said in a statement.