TBILISI. Jan 24 (Interfax-AVN) - The Georgian Border Guard Department believes that Chechen guerillas will resume attempts to cross into Georgia in spring.
"Russia should close down the border reliably to avoid it," the department's chief-of-staff Colonel Kornely Salia told Interfax-Military News Agency on Friday.
He expressed readiness to cooperate with Russian colleagues.
Salia said he was surprised by Friday's statement of Lieutenant General Valery Putov, acting chief of the North Caucasus regional border guard department, who said that international terrorists are still operating in the Georgian Pankisi gorge.
According to Salia, if Russian colleagues have such an information they should officially hand it to Georgia, which never happened.
At the same time he stressed that " it is now impossible to stay in the mountains, at least due to severe climate conditions, as the snow is 1.5-2 meters thick there."
Putov earlier told Interfax that "some terrorists in the Pankisi gorge pose as refugees, others hide their weapons and mix with civilians, and the rest are hiding at disguised bases in the mountains, waiting for the spring to start their activities".