NR: "...ready and willing to fight again against the Russian military if it proves necessary."
Length: 2:28
LARGE (28.6 MB) ----- SMALL (3.0 MB)
Michael's prepared piece on the destruction of the railway bridge. He finds the firing cable that was used to connect to the detonator device and follows it to the protected site where Russian soldiers sheltered from the blast. Georgians are already working to clear the bridge debris.
FREDRICKA WHITFIELD, CNN ANCHOR: Russia has signed the truce with Georgia today, but at last report Russian tanks are still patrolling, not pulling out. Russian's foreign minister says there will be no full withdrawal without new security measures. Well, today Georgia is blaming the Russians for setting fires in a national park as well. That's the source of Georgian spring water exports. And as Michael Ware shows us, the Russians have bombed an important bridge.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MICHAEL WARE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Despite the signing of a cease-fire agreement between Georgia and Russia, it appears clear that the Russian military here in Georgian territory continues to flex its muscle. Not only have we been witnessing the ongoing presence of Russian armored elements just outside the Georgian city of Gori, but where I'm standing now is on a destroyed railway bridge that the Russian military brought down.
So this is an electric firing cable that leads from the blast site somewhere over in this direction. And if we follow it, we'll find where the Russians were positioned when they detonated the explosion. And when we follow the cord, we found that it ends here, behind this culvert not far from the bridge. This is clearly where the Russian soldiers were with their detonating device as they set off the explosion. And, indeed, what do we find? But a Russian cigarette butt.
As workers above me are feverishly trying to clear the tangled wreckage of the train line, the Georgian government says the destruction of this rail line that carries oil to the key port city of Poti on the Black Sea coast have broken that agreement.
GIORGI BARAMIDZE, GEORGIAN VICE PRIME MINISTER: By doing this, Russians make not only Georgia suffer but Armenia, Azerbaijan, even companies like BP and others that are transporting oil using this particular railway.
WARE: And even though there are few, if any, real military responses that can be made either by the west or by Georgia itself, the Georgian vice prime minister said that his country was ready and willing to fight again against the Russians if it proves necessary.
Michael Ware, CNN, on the outskirts of Gori.