Tbilisi (AFP)

Georgia said it feared Friday a "serious confrontation" with its separatist region of South Ossetia, de facto controlled by Russia, against a backdrop of tensions at a checkpoint along the demarcation line.

The Georgian Foreign Ministry said it has observed a "mobilization of military equipment and soldiers" near the village of Chorchana, where Tbilisi has set up a checkpoint whose dismantling is being demanded by South Ossetian officials.

Ministry spokeswoman Mari Narchemashvili told AFP that the situation was likely to "degenerate into a serious military confrontation", as was the case at the time of the flash conflict between Russia and Georgia in the summer. 2008, already for the control of this small region.

Referring to the dismantling of this checkpoint, the representative of the separatists Egor Kotchiev threatened: "If this is not done, we will take all legal measures to ensure the safety of the population of South Ossetia and our border ", he said on television.

The security services of the separatists, quoted by Russian news agencies, said the checkpoint was near the village of Ouista, located on the territory under their control and called Tsnelissi in Georgian. They added that a "humanitarian operation" was underway on the spot, without giving more details.

Anatoli Bibilov, the president of South Ossetia, then ordered Friday the establishment of a checkpoint near Tsnelissi. "I hope that Georgia (...) will do everything to put an end to the instability caused by its illegal actions," Bibilov was quoted by the Russian media as saying that "a solution through the use of force was really not desirable. "

In a statement, the US State Department on its side called to "avoid escalation".

The Russian Foreign Ministry, while calling for "restraint," accused Tbilisi on Friday of "deliberately fueling tensions in recent months at the border with provocations and propaganda campaigns backed by the West."

A meeting between Georgian authorities and South Ossetians took place on Thursday under European mediation, but gave rise to "intense exchanges" before being "interrupted", according to the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) .

Russia and Georgia have long opposed the ambitions of the former Soviet republic of the Caucasus to join the European Union and NATO, an event considered by Moscow as a dangerous encroachment on its zone of influence.

In the summer of 2008, these tensions turned into open conflict when the Russian army intervened on Georgian territory to rescue small South Ossetia, where Tbilisi had launched a deadly military operation.

In five days, Russian forces routed the Georgian army and threatened to take the capital before a peace deal negotiated by French President Nicolas Sarkozy was signed.

© 2019 AFP