Russia and Georgia's defence ministers tried to calm increasingly shrill rhetoric over two breakaway regions on Tuesday by promising to cooperate in the search for a peaceful solution, Russian news agencies reported. Georgia's determination to bring South Ossetia and Abkhazia under central control -- spelling the end of a decade of rule by separatists with support in Moscow -- has sparked sabre-rattling that over the past few weeks threatened to turn into bloodshed. Russian Defence Minister Sergei Ivanov said Russia was ready to quit two Soviet-era military bases in Georgia -- one in the capital Tbilisi and one in the southern town of Akhalkalaki. "In the near future we are prepared to hand them over to the Georgian Defence Ministry -- only the Georgian Defence Ministry -- under an agreement," RIA-Novosti news agency quoted Ivanov as saying, without giving details of the agreement. His Georgian counterpart Georgy Baramidze, visiting Moscow for three days, praised his hosts for their approach. "Russia's sincerity in the search for a peaceful solution is very encouraging," Itar-Tass quoted him as saying. --More 2002 Local Time 1702 GMT
