TSKHINVAL. Sept 13 (Interfax) - South Ossetia's state security committee has said that Georgia's Interior Ministry has stepped up work on parts of the joint border.
"On a Georgian territory opposite the Tskhinval district's village of Grom, Georgian police are conducting area reconnaissance and preparations for installing more observation posts or roadblocks. Thus, in the Gori Municipality's village of Adzvi bordering the Artseu village of South Ossetia's Tskhinval District, Georgian police numbers have been raised from eight to 40 personnel. The post has an Otocar Cobra armored carrier and four Toyota Hilux vehicles," the committee said in a statement on Thursday.
Police numbers at the posts in Adzvistavi and Akhalubani (Gori Municipality) increased from six to 12, the statement said.
"In the Gori Municipality village of Khurvaleti, construction has begun to install a Georgian police post. In particular, the building brigade demolished a dilapidated property and cleared the site using construction equipment," it said.
These Georgian activities on the joint border are aimed at destabilizing the situation, eroding the border regime, and creating preconditions for tension escalation, the statement said.
In August, Tskhinval protested the construction by Tbilisi of a police post in the area of the Georgian village of Chorchana, which is close to the village of Tsnelis (Uista) controlled by South Ossetia. The Georgian State Security Service responded by saying that the police post was a standard one and was being built on the territory controlled by the Georgian authorities. The post poses no danger to South Ossetia, the Service said.