Georgia says Russian arrests at sea stoke tensions

By Matt Robinson and Stephanie Nebehay

TBILISI/GENEVA (Reuters) - Georgia on Wednesday accused Russia of trying to escalate tensions by detaining five Georgian citizens off the Black Sea coast near the breakaway Russian-backed region of Abkhazia.

A Russian foreign ministry spokesman confirmed that Russian border guards detained five people on Tuesday for fishing illegally, but said they were all residents of Abkhazia, which Moscow recognises as an independent country.

The border guards acted "in full accordance with Russian-Abkhazian agreements," under which Russian coastguard ships patrol the waters off Abkhazia, the spokesman said.

There have been a number of brief detentions of Georgians in recent weeks, mainly in rebel South Ossetia, the focus of last year's five-day war between Georgia and Russia.

Georgia's foreign ministry said Russian forces had "kidnapped" five of its citizens in Georgian territorial waters.

"The Kremlin employs such methods in order to escalate the situation in the territories adjacent to Georgia's occupied regions and provide all preconditions to push the conflict into a 'hot' stage," the ministry said.

Russia said the incident took place 18 km (11 miles) south of Ochamchira in Abkhaz waters.

Officials of Russia, Georgia and the two breakaway regions met in Geneva on Wednesday for an eighth round of security discussions mediated by the United Nations, European Union and Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe.