UAV shot down - Russia to blame?

Georgia today accused Russia of an “unprovoked act of aggression” after a Russian jet allegedly shot down an unmanned Georgian reconnaissance plane, Alexi Mostrous writes.

Officials in Georgia’s capital, Tbilisi, released video footage which they said showed a MiG-29 fighter launching a missile at the Georgian plane as it flew over the country’s breakaway Abkhazia region.

The allegation - dismissed as “nonsense” by Moscow - is likely to aggravate tensions between the countries, which are locked in a standoff over Georgia’s ambitions to join NATO and Moscow's support for Abkhaz separatists.

“The Government of Georgia strongly condemns the unprovoked act of aggression that took place on April 20, 2008,” the Georgian foreign ministry said in a statement. It summoned Russia’s ambassador to hand him a note of protest.

A spokesman for Russia’s air force said: “Nonsense. What would a Russian jet fighter be doing over Georgian territory?”

The video footage shows a jet aircraft banking to face the drone. A bright flash can be seen as a missile is launched and heads toward the drone.

A few seconds later the screen goes blank.

No identification markings are visible on the aircraft that fired the missile.

“A Russian MiG-29 fighter jet shot down an unarmed, unmanned air vehicle which was performing basic reconnaissance over Georgian territory,” Colonel David Nairashvili, commander of Georgia’s air force, told Reuters.

“It’s absolutely illegal for a Russian MiG-29 to be there,” he said.

“The MiG-29 has a distinctive twin-tail marking. It’s a Russian aircraft. Georgia does not possess it, nor do Abkhaz separatists.”

In Washington, a State Department spokesman, Tom Casey, said the United States was concerned by reports of the incident and was seeking information from the Russian Government.

Abkhazia, on the Black Sea coast, is internationally recognised as part of Georgia. It has been controlled by Moscow-backed separatists since a war in the early 1990s.

Abkhazia’s separatist administration said on Sunday that its own forces had shot down the drone because it was violating Abkhaz air space and breaching ceasefire agreements.

Last week, Georgia accused Moscow of a de facto annexation of Abkhazia and a second breakaway Georgian region, South Ossetia, after President Putin ordered his Government to establish closer ties with the separatists.