MOSCOW, Aug 10 (AFP) - Georgia's defense minister said Tuesday his country was ready to fight if needed to win back the pro-Russian separatist region of South Ossetia but would prefer to resolve the dispute through negotiation.
"The army should always be prepared for war, but we are against it in principle and will do everything possible to avoid armed conflict," Georgy Baramidze told Moscow Echo radio.
His comments followed talks with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Ivanov, and came amid growing tension between Russia and Georgia over the breakaway region.
Georgia's new President Mikhail Saakashvili has vowed to win back control over the entirety of his fractured Caucasus state after toppling the country's leadership in a peaceful "rose revolution" last year.
Baramidze's talks with Ivanov did not appear to go well.
Ivanov came out with a furious comment to reporters while Baramidze stood at his side, as the two feuded over Georgia's allegations that Russian planes were spying on the republic and warnings that the next one would be shot down.
"This is all nonsense and delirium," Ivanov said as Baramidze stood at his side before reporters.
"What kind of plane was it anyway," Ivanov demanded while Baramidze stood silently, turning away his eyes.
Baramidze came to Moscow to resolve a growing military conflict in the corridor between South Ossetia and Georgia that is also guarded by Russian troops.
The conflict has so far been reserved to a war of words, but also sporadic gun fire and arrests of various peacekeepers in the region.
The talks in Moscow also focused on Abkhazia, another pro-Moscow region in Georgia that serves as a popular summer resort for Russians.
In blistering remarks, Saakashvili threatened to sink foreign ships that enter the region without permission last week.
"Abkhazia is not a place to holiday, it is a war zone... (Russian) tourists have nothing to do there," he said before leaving for a visit to the United States.
He tried to soften those remarks in televised comments Tuesday, saying that "my warnings did not concern tourists, just ships."
Seen as a young, popular reformer, Saakashvili has vowed to reunify his fractured republic since toppling the administration of veteran leader Eduard Shevardnadze in a peaceful revolution last year.
He has also developed closer relations with the West and his country will soon be home to a key US-backed oil pipeline that skirts Russian territory and has been furiously opposed by Moscow.
So far clashes between Moscow and Tbilisi have been limited to a war of words, but the nightmare scenario is an armed conflict between Russia and Georgia, with Western governments -- which back Georgia's new government -- dragged into the quagmire too.