Radio Liberty reports that president Mikheil Saakashvili has visited the site of the gunfight that has killed at least three members of Georgia’s security forces and 11 Islamic militants supposedly coming from the neighboring Daghestan region of Russia.
On August 30 during his visit to the Lopota Gorge, Saakashvili promised that his government would not let militants to move freely through Georgia.
The kidnapping of Georgian citizens is “unacceptable” for him.
Officials said thast as a result of action by the security forces 10 Georgian hostages, who had been seized by the militants, were freed.
Reuters reported Saakashvili’s words: “Another attempt to export a new wave of tension and instability into Georgia from our northern neighbor will be stopped at the very beginning.”
Earlier the Interior Ministry said five Georgian soldiers had also been wounded.
On August 30 it was unclear whether the militants might still be holding Georgian security officers who might have replaced for the hostages.
At the same day a website associated with the Islamic insurgency in Daghestan (vdagestan.com) remarked that the fighters in the Lopota Gorge were from what it called the “Velayat [province] of Daghestan belonging to Imarat Kavkaz [Caucasus Emirate].”
The information that the fighters had taken any hostages was denied by the website, and Georgian authorities were blamed for starting the shooting that led to the fight.
That attack on August 30 incited Daghestan’s leader, Magomedsalam Magomedov,in order to help police bolster security in the violence-torn region to order local officials to create self-defense and vigilante groups.
