Nogovitsyn: demining of South Ossetia will last long

The mining of the territory of South Ossetia during last year's August events was chaotic; the Russian party has no mine field maps; therefore, demining will take a lot of time. This was stated by General-Colonel Anatoly Nogovitsyn, Deputy Chief of the Joint Staff of Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.

"In South Ossetia, we're worried by quite a lot of explosive objects. By today, we've found and disposed over 160,000 such articles," said the General.

The demining process continues, but, according to Mr Nogovitsyn, it is difficult, "because we've received no mine field maps."

"It was done spontaneously (mining of territories during the August events, - comment of the "Caucasian Knot") and in different directions. Now, demining continues, and this is one of the main tasks of our military grouping, which is rendering engineering support to the republic," Anatoly Nogovitsyn said at a meeting with journalists.

According to his story, the peaceful population of South Ossetia helps Russian military sappers to find unexploded shells and other ordnances, remaining after the August events of 2008.

Let us remind you that earlier Thomas Hammarberg, Commissioner of the Council of Europe on Human Rights, called demining among major problems after the warfare in South Ossetia.

We remind you also that earlier the Ministry of Education of South Ossetia decided to give special lessons to children on how to behave in case of detecting any explosives.