Russo-Georgian War

The August 2008 Russo-Georgian War, also known as the Russian invasion of Georgia, was a war waged against Georgia by the Russian Federation and the Russian-backed separatist regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The fighting took place in the strategically important South Caucasus region. It is regarded as the first European war of the 21st century.

Following the 1991 Georgian independence referendum, the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic declared independence as a sovereign state amidst the dissolution of the Soviet Union. A year later, the South Ossetia war and the Abkhazia war resulted in Georgia's partial loss of territory in what had been the South Ossetian Autonomous Oblast and the Abkhaz Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, respectively, to two internationally unrecognized separatist movements that were supported by the newly independent Russian Federation. A series of ceasefire agreements brokered by Russia in 1992, 1993, and 1994 resulted in the establishment of the "Joint Control Commission" in South Ossetia, but Georgians were ethnically cleansed from Abkhazia by 1998. In 2000, Vladimir Putin became Russia's president, while Georgia experienced the Rose Revolution in 2003 and moved towards forging closer ties with the United States and NATO. Consequently, Georgia–Russia relations deteriorated rapidly by 2006 and spiralled into a diplomatic crisis by 2008.

On 1 August 2008, the Russian-backed South Ossetian forces started shelling Georgian villages, with a sporadic response from Georgian peacekeepers in the area. Intensifying artillery attacks by the South Ossetian separatists broke a 1992 ceasefire agreement. To put an end to these attacks, Georgian army units were sent into the South Ossetian conflict zone on 7 August and took control of most of Tskhinvali, a separatist capital and stronghold, within hours.