Georgian authorities report loss of 168 militaries in conflict with Russia

Today at a joint press conference in Tbilisi, spokesmen of the Ministries of Defence, Internal Affairs and Public Health gave new figures of Georgian casualties in the conflict with Russia. Under the aggregated data, 168 militaries were lost. Meanwhile, the Russian military reconnaissance asserts that Georgia had lost about three thousand power agents.

"168 militaries were lost, the bodies of 154 of them were brought out of the conflict zone," Batu Kuteliya, Deputy Minister of Defence, has reported and added that "these losses are rather high."

According to his version, which is quoted by the IA "News-Georgia", 110 bodies have been identified, others are still unknown.

Ekaterina Zguladze, Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of Georgia, has informed that 14 MIA employees were lost; six of them are regarded as missing.

According to the Ministry of Public Health of Georgia, the peaceful population lost 188 persons; all of them have been identified. "This information arrived from the entities of the Ministry of Public Health and local administrations," said Minister of Public Health Alexander Kvitashvili. As he said, most of peaceful residents were killed by bombardments, several of them died from heart attacks during air raids.

The RIA "Novosti", in its turn, has reported today with reference to a source in the Russian military reconnaissance that about three thousand Georgian militaries and other power agents had been lost in August during the attack on South Ossetia and subsequent warfare with Russia.