Watchdog

The New York-based watchdog Human Rights Watch (HRW) is calling on the European Union to deploy a "robust" security mission to protect civilians displaced by the conflict in Georgia and its breakaway region of South Ossetia.

HRW accused both Georgian and Russian military forces of using "indiscriminate and disproportionate force" that caused civilian deaths on both sides.

"We'd like the EU to take steps to provide protection to all civilians who are in need of it, to protect them from incursions by armed militias or the kind of things that can happen at checkpoints," Rachel Denber of Human Rights Watch said.

In a statement, HRW also called for international groups to send missions to investigate and document what it says has been "unlawful" behavior by the South Ossetian militia and Georgian and Russian military forces.

"This is essential to ensure that people who are displaced by the conflict -- whether they are in Gori or in South Ossetia -- can return safely," Denber said. "They will need international protection, that has become clear. It's not possible to rely only on Russian forces to protect civilians from South Ossetian militias."

She said that while Russian forces had taken steps to prevent the South Ossetian militia from entering Georgian villages, they had not halted all looting and other crimes.

Human Rights Watch has already accused Russia of using cluster bombs against Georgian civilians and the Georgian military of firing rockets indiscriminately into South Ossetian villages at the start of the conflict.

-- Reuters

Human Rights Watch (HRW) has accused Russia of dropping cluster bombs in populated areas of Georgia during its military offensive there. Russia denies the charge.

Human Rights Watch said Russian aircraft used cluster bombs in two separate raids on the towns of Ruisi and Gori on August 12, killing at least 11 civilians and injuring dozens.

Asked about the report, the deputy chief of Russia's General Staff, Colonel-General Anatoly Nogovitsyn, told a news conference: "We never use cluster bombs. There is no need to do so."

The Gori strike killed at least eight, Human Rights Watch said, including a Dutch cameraman. An Israeli journalist was among the wounded and an armored vehicle belonging to Reuters news agency was perforated with shrapnel.

HRW cited interviews with victims, doctors and military personnel, as well as photos of craters and video footage of the Gori attack, to support its assertion that Russia had used cluster bombs. It said video showed more than two dozen simultaneous explosions during the attack, characteristic of cluster bombs.

More than 100 nations have agreed to ban the use of cluster bombs. Russia has not.

HRW called on Russia to provide precise dates of its cluster attacks "in order to facilitate clean up of the inevitable lingering contamination from cluster bomb submunitions that failed to explode on contact but remain deadly."

-- Reuters