Smash hit

The body of a man, his mouth caked with blood, lay in a street in the village of Dzardzanis and nearby the body of a bearded man could be seen crushed under an overturned mini-van, an AFP journalist reported.

The Human Rights Watch group said its researchers in South Ossetia had "witnessed terrifying scenes of destruction in four villages that used to be populated exclusively by ethnic Georgians".

Earlier, Kremlin officials and army chiefs had denied Georgian claims that 50 Russian tanks were in Gori, which the Georgian army abandoned two days ago.

Instead, Russia continued to vent its anger on what it called Georgian aggression and atrocities and said that its troops would only return to their positions from before the conflict once Georgian soldiers had returned to their barracks.

Vladimir Putin's mastery checkmates the West

Michael Binyon says Russia has been biding its time - but its victory in Georgia has been brutal and brilliant

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Sergei Lavrov, the Foreign Minister, also ruled out the continuing participation of Georgian troops in the international peace-keeping force which has been stationed in the disputed territory for over a decade. The Georgians were "traitors" who had turned round and fired on their Russian colleagues, he said.

Russia said that it had suffered 74 dead, 171 wounded and 19 missing from its armed forces in the brief conflict. It continued to accuse Georgia of "ethnic cleansing" and "genocide" against the Russian majority in South Ossetia.

Russia says that some 2,000 civilians were killed and 100,000 displaced. Condoleezza Rice, the US Secretary of State, urged Mr Lavrov in a telephone call to desist from using the two expressions in relation to Georgia's actions, the Russian minister said. President Medvedev also used the terms yesterday with Mr Sarkozy.

While the war of words raged on between a humiliated Georgia and a re-emboldened Kremlin, the West acknowledged that the five-day war had opened a new chapter in its relations with the former superpower that was once again flexing its muscles.

The United States cancelled joint military exercises and David Miliband, the Foreign Secretary, said that Europe should reassess its ties with Russia after its "aggressive" behaviour in Georgia. The Royal Navy also pulled out of joint exercises that Russia was to host in the eastern post of Vladivostok later this month.

In a sign of heightened regional tensions, Viktor Yushchenko, the Ukranian President, signed a decree tightening restrictions on Russia's Black Sea Fleet, which is based in the Ukrainian port of Sevastopol.

It was also becoming increasingly clear that Georgia's assaults on Russian forces in its separatist province had backfired. Mr Saakashvili's conduct came under fire from Eduard Shevardnadze, the Soviet elder statesman who was Georgia's President for eight years until 2003.

"Georgia should not have intervened in [South Ossetian capital] Tskhinvali in such an ill-prepared manner. This was a grave mistake," Mr Shevardnadze told Bild, the German newspaper. "The situation is extremely tense and very complicated. What happens next is uncertain. I hope that the talks of President Saakashvili with his Western partners will lead to an end to the conflict," he said.

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