Georgia clashes with rebel forces

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Four people are reported to have been killed in clashes in Georgia's breakaway region of South Ossetia.

Georgian police said they were fired upon as they tracked smugglers. One of their number died and two were hurt.

However South Ossetian police said they came under fire from Georgian forces using heavy small arms and mortars, and that three of their number died.

South Ossetia is under a tense stand-off between Georgian forces and separatists, who are backed by Russia.

Last weekend a helicopter carrying Georgia's defence minister over the region was shot at.

After the latest clash Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili said on television: "Our task today is not to yield to any large-scale provocations. Time is on Georgia's side."

Mr Saakashvili vowed on his election in 2004 to re-unite the country, after its violent rupture in the early 1990s.

Spasms of violence have interrupted a tense ceasefire.

Russia 'standing by'

The latest clashes broke out at around 1100 (0800 GMT) on Friday.

Later, a South Ossetian government spokeswoman Irina Gagloyeva said Georgian forces had opened fire with grenade-launchers and machine guns on the region's capital, Tskhinvali, at around midnight and that South Ossetian forces had returned fire.

She said there were no reported injuries.

Georgian officials could not be reached for comment, the Associated Press said.

Georgia's foreign ministry said the Russian peacekeeping deployment in the region had done little to step in and prevent the violence.

"Friday's armed incident in the Tskhinvali region yet again exposed the unwillingness of Russian peacekeepers to safeguard the peace process in the conflict zone," it said.