TSKHINVAL. Oct 24 (Interfax) - A border guard unit of the South Ossetian State Security Committee stopped a patrol of the European Union Monitoring Mission (EUMM) near the populated area of Tsnelis on the Georgian border on Thursday morning, Yegor Kochiyev, the head of the South Ossetian delegation in the meeting held in the format of the Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism (IPRM), told Interfax.
The EUMM patrol violated the South Ossetian border and the border guards expelled the violators to the Georgian territory after being convinced that the people really were EUMM members, Kochiyev said.
"A border guard unit of the South Ossetian State Security Committee stopped a patrol of the European Union Monitoring Mission near the populated area of Uista (Tsnelis) at 12:50 p.m. After the border guards became convinced that the people really were an EUMM patrol, they were told that they had violated the border and were expelled from the republic," he said.
South Ossetia immediately activated a hotline, via which the EUMM was told that such steps were unacceptable and seriously undermined the already fragile security situation in the area.
"Such actions by the monitors are a provocation before the next technical meeting on the issue of relieving tensions in the Uista area," Kochiyev said.
The South Ossetian State Security Committee said earlier that it had "materials indicating active work by Georgian defense and security agencies to prepare for a large-scale provocation on the site."
The Georgian State Security Service said on Thursday that the statement by the South Ossetian authorities was misinformation.