A car carrying a senior Russian delegation was stopped near the town of Gori 16 miles from Tskhinvali, the capital of the self-proclaimed republic of South Ossetia, a RIA Novosti correspondent reported from the scene.
Yury Popov, Russia's ambassador at large, labeled the incident a "gross two-day provocation designed to disrupt the peace process."
"In these conditions, when it is unknown who rules the ball in Tbilisi, a question arises: is a certain military dictatorship emerging in Georgia that is trying by all means possible to disrupt the peace process and resolve the conflict using military means?"
Earlier he said the move was out of line with the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations.
"Under the Vienna Convention [on Diplomatic Relations], diplomatic mission cars are not subject to searches," Popov said.
One member of the delegation, General Valery Yevnevich, a deputy commander of Russia's Land Forces, had his passport taken away and it was not returned.
Popov said the issue of signing a Georgian-South Ossetian statement on security guarantees and non-resumption of hostilities was again coming to the foreground.
Georgia's military police released the Russian Embassy car after holding it for an hour. RIA Novosti correspondent Natalya Ratiani, who was in the car, said that the police had fired in the air and sworn at the diplomats to stop the car.
After that, she said, they took belongings from the trunk and told Russian diplomats to go to the embassy for further investigation.
But the head of Georgia's military police downplayed the incident, saying the Russian embassy car had been stopped for a routine document check.
"This was not a detention. We detained no one. This was simply a document check," Alexander Sukhitashvili said.
