The Caucasus is the kind of place where, when the guns start firing,
it's hard to stop them. That is the brutal reality of South Ossetia,
where a small conflict is beginning to spread exponentially.

Leave aside the geopolitics for the moment and have pity for the people who
will suffer most from this, the citizens - mostly ethnic Ossetians but
also Georgians - who have already died in their hundreds. It is a tiny
and vulnerable place, with no more than 75,000 inhabitants of both
nationalities mixed up in a patchwork of villages and one sleepy
provincial town in the foothills of the Caucasus.

(To read on, click here.... )