Russia Presses Into 2nd Front in Georgia

[viktorbretalins]

SENAKI, Georgia — Russia issued an ultimatum to Georgia on Monday to disarm its troops along the boundary with the pro-Russian separatist enclave of Abkhazia as Russian tanks rolled across the border and occupied a military base in western Georgia.  The move was a sign that fighting could escalate on a second, western front after the conflict initially broke out last week around South Ossetia, the separatist enclave further east.  President Dmitri A. Medvedev of Russia said its forces had "completed a significant part of the operations to oblige Georgia, the Georgian authorities, to restore peace to South Ossetia," according to a transcript of his remarks with Anatoly Serdyukov, the defense minister, on the Kremlin Web site.  Separately, Russia said it was seeking an emergency meeting with NATO to discuss the Georgian crisis.  But the Russian Defense Ministry said that armored vehicles and troops had overrun a military base in the Georgian town of Senaki, 25 miles south of the Abkhazian border, suggesting that Russian troops had already begun to move south from the enclave into Georgia proper.  The Russian ultimatum, issued by Maj. Gen. Sergei Chaban, commander of Russian peacekeeping forces in Abkhazia, called for Georgian troops to disarm in the Zugdidi District, along the border between Abkhazia and Georgia.  Russia has poured extra forces into Abkhazia, where it now has at least 9,000 troops and 350 armored vehicles.  Giga Bokeria, a Georgian official close to the president, said the ultimatum raised alarms that Russian troops would now make a broader push into Georgian territory in the west of the country. Many Georgian troops have been tied up in fighting farther east near South Ossetia.  A pivotal question in the conflict, which has involved heavy fighting since late last week, is whether Russia would push beyond these regions and farther into Georgia.  On Sunday, a reporter for The New York Times saw an armored personnel carrier emblazoned with the letters MT, the Russian abbreviation for peacekeepers, on the street in Senaki and on Monday saw tanks and troops occupying the military base there. However, there was no immediate sign of fighting.    Read Mpre...