MOSCOW, February 8 (RIA Novosti) - The Georgian military police detained three Russian peacekeeping officers Wednesday, a South Ossetian official said.
Irina Gagloyeva, the head of the South Ossetian information and press committee, said: "A group of Russian officers left today at 5:20 p.m. [local time] for a routine inspection in a Russian peacekeeping battalion... They were stopped in the Georgian village Kurta by an illegally set up checkpoint of the Georgian military police, and then taken in an unknown direction."
"The fate of the three Russian officers is unknown."
"The detained are: Land Forces Colonel Vladimir Ivanov, Lieutenant Colonel Gennady Petrosyan, and Defense Ministry Military Auto Inspection Officer Valery Kryuk," Gagloyeva said.
The incident is the latest in a string of events that have raised tensions between the Georgian authorities and Russian peacekeepers stationed in the area. After a road accident on February 1 involving a convoy of peacekeepers and a car owned by a Georgian driver, hundreds of Georgian soldiers and armed policemen arrived on the scene and confiscated the Russian truck, withholding it pending payment of compensation.
Russian troops are stationed in the zone of the conflict between Georgia and South Ossetia which erupted in the early 1990s. The troops are part of the Joint Collective Peacekeeping Forces.
