Breaking: Truce A Joke, Russian Forces Speed Towards Georgian Capital
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Last night they broke the truce by rolling into Gori, and now they are going after the Capital itself. The Russians admit their forces are headed toward the Capital, but that they don’t plan on entering it. We shall see…
Fox:
DEVELOPING STORY:  Russian armored vehicles are moving deeper into Georgian territory, shattering a truce to end the six days of fighting.
Georgian officials say the city of Gori was looted and bombed by the Russians. An AP reporter later saw dozens of tanks and military vehicles leaving the city, roaring south.
Russian troops waved at journalists and one soldier jokingly shouted to a photographer: “Come with us, beauty, we’re going to Tbilisi!”
Georgian President Mikhail Saaksvilli says the U.S. and the west have underestimated Russia’s regional ambitions, saying Georgia warned the west that a large-scale Russian invasion was coming but were told by the U.S. State Department that the Russians “are not going to do that.”
A FOX News reported in Tbilisi says they received a text message from other reporters warning them to “get out now.” On their way out they witnessed more than 50 Russian armored vehicles on the road into Gori.
Related: Russians Break Truce, Roll Into Key Georgian City
A Russian armoured column comprising at least 100 vehicles was heading south from the Georgian city of Gori this afternoon towards the capital, Tbilisi, making a mockery of a ceasefire agreed only yesterday to end the Caucasus conflict.
The Russian column, which included armoured personnel carriers, troop-carrying trucks and support trucks with anti-aircraft guns, was witnessed by Times correspondent Tony Halpin.
Gori, about 17 miles from the disputed enclave of South Ossetia, has been blocked off but other witnesses saw at least half a dozen Russian tanks patrolling the town.
Halpin was blocked at a checkpoint manned by a Russian unit from Chechnya but said that civilians fleeing the region complained that South Ossetian militiamen backed by other Chechen soldiers were “killing people in the villages”. Smoke could be seen rising from nearby hillsides and machine gun fire rang out.
He told Times Online: “I am witnessing a huge column of Russian vehicles coming out of Gori on the road towards Tbilisi. There are something like 100 Russian lorries, support trucks and some armoured personnel carriers in a column that has taken something like 20 minutes to pass me.
“Gori has been sealed off by Russian troops. I was able to get about a kilometre from the city until I got to a checkpoint manned by Chechen troops who are under orders to stay there and have set up shooting positions.”
Asked whether the Russian actions were in breach of the ceasefire brokered yesterday by President Sarkozy of France, under which both sides are meant to withdraw to their positions from before the conflict erupted last Thursday night, Halpin replied: “The ceasefire agreement specified that they were meant to go backwards. They are clearly going forwards.”
An AFP journalist reported that a convoy of around 60 tanks and APCs had left Gori. The reporter said that Russian soldiers were leaning out of the windows of the trucks shouting “Tbilisi! Tbilisi!†and waving Russian flags. The trucks were loaded with tents and supplies.
Gori lies about 75 km (45 miles) from Tbilisi.
More details soon…


