A Bit More Detail

• blogTO notes that TTC tunnels will get WiFi in 2018.


• Border Thinking's Laura Augustín shares some of Edvard Munch's brothel paintings.


• Centauri Dreams looks at the latest science on fast radio bursts.


• Dangerous Minds shares some of the sexy covers of Yugoslavian computer magazine Računari.


• Dead Things looks at the latest research into dinosaur eggs.


• The Dragon's Gaze links to a paper suggesting that a high surface magnetic field in a red giant star indicates a recent swallowing of a planet.


• Language Log shares an ad for a portable smog mask from China.


• Lawyers, Guns and Money takes issue with the idea of NAFTA being of general benefit to Mexico.


• Torontoist looks at the history of Toronto General Hospital.


• Window on Eurasia is skeptical about an American proposal for Ukraine, and suggests Ossetian reunification within Russia is the next annexation likely to be made by Russia.

• The Boston Globe's Big Picture reports on the scene from Palmyra after the expulsion of ISIS.


• James Bow links to a documentary on the search for Planet Nine.


• The Dragon's Tales speculates that the ability to enter torpor might have saved mammals from the en of the Cretaceous extinction.


• Honourary Canadian Philip Turner discovers the Chiac dialect of the Acadians of the Maritimes.


• Joe. My. God. notes that Afrika Bambaataa has been accused of molesting young boys.


• Language Hat reports on the renaming of the Czech Republic "Czechia."


• Marginal Revolution notes Singapore has a graciousness index.


• Personal Reflections' Jim Belshaw reflects on Australia's upcoming elections.


• pollotenchegg maps the 2012 elections in Ukraine.


• The Power and the Money's Noel Maurer explains how American investment in the Philippines was made impossible, so as to avoid welding that country to the US.


• The Russian Demographics Blog links to a paper examining contraception and abortion among the Czechs and Slovaks in recent decades.


• Towleroad notes Ted Cruz' disinterest in protecting gay people.


• Window on Eurasia notes the scale of Russia's demographic problems, report the debate on whether Russia will or will not annex South Ossetia, and suggest Russia is losing influence in Central Asia.


• The Financial Times' The World predicts the end for Dilma Rousseff.

• blogTO notes the construction of another tall condo on Wellesley between Yonge and Church.


• The Dragon's Gaze links to a paper observing that the Titius-Bode law apparently doesn't work for exoplanets.


• The Dragon's Tales observes that Western sanctions against the Russian space industry could harm its long-term prospects vis-a-vis China and the United States.


• Eastern Approaches covers Ukrainian industrialist Rinat Akhmetov's turn towards supporting a united Ukraine.


• The Financial Times' The World blog notes that Russia is pivoting towards Asia, especially China, to compensate for its broken Western ties.


• Lawyers, Guns and Money tries to explain the concept of privilege.


• Marginal Revolution quotes Neal Stephenson's argument that dystopian science fiction is popular because it's cheaper to film.


• Torontoist examines ongoing efforts to revitalize the downtown neighbourhood of Alexandra Park.


• Towleroad reports on the jailing of six men in Morocco for their homosexuality.


• The Volokh Conspiracy examines ethical issues with being a corporation in the United States.


• Window on Eurasia notes that a prominent North Ossetian has called for the annexation of ex-Georgian South Ossetia into the Russian republic.

Over the 20 years of political and military confrontation between Georgia and its two separatist regions, it is South Ossetia that has had relatively better chance for settling its problems. The most difficult time has undoubtedly been the last few years since the 2008 war. Relations are virtually frozen: on the one hand, the Georgian government is refusing to accept recommendations which could have allowed greater cooperation; on the other hand, it offers no alternative to the EU’s recommendations and says nothing about any prospects for settling the Georgian-Ossetian question.

The shadow of the August war still looms large in Georgian-Ossetian relations and the bombing of Tskhinvali, the region’s capital, by Georgian artillery in August 2008 dominates the Ossetian media to this day. Unofficially, however, the Ossetian side has already expressed a hope that economic relations will be restored, most particularly in the Georgian-Ossetian border zone, where they were cut off unilaterally by the Georgians before the war.

The Ergneti open-air market extends over several hectares right on the administrative border. It came into being spontaneously in the second half of the 1990s, thanks to improved relations between the then presidents, Eduard Shevardnadze and Lyudvig Chibirov. The Ergneti market was an unofficial free trade zone of sorts and the business operations that took place there led to a rapid improvement in Georgian-Ossetian relations. Georgian currency began to circulate in the South Ossetian financial sector and people were able to move around on both sides of the conflict zone almost without restriction. The level of trust in trade relations improved to such a degree that trading partners on both sides distributed goods without prepayment. Georgian and Ossetian NGOs ran joint projects; the subject of the 1991 war almost disappeared from the media on both sides.

By 2003 Georgia and Ossetia were ready to start negotiating a political settlement, but relations began to deteriorate with the arrival in power of President Mikheil Saakashvili. His most important pre-election pledge had been the restoration of the country's territorial integrity, but he tried to force events: under the banner of fighting corruption and improving the economy, the Georgian government closed down the Ergneti market, which accounted for a substantial part of South Ossetian revenue. The South Ossetian administration took this as a manifestation of political pressure. Georgian and Ossetian experts believed that economic regulation of the Ergneti market would have been possible, and its arbitrary closure led to a cooling in relations between the two sides and the eventual evaporation of any hope of a political settlement. The Georgian government responded with greater political pressure and militant rhetoric, which, in the end, escalated into the Russian-Georgian war of August 2008.

The town of Akhalgori remained under Georgian jurisdiction after 1992, but was occupied by South Ossetia in 2008. During the August war, refugees from this town and from other parts of the conflict zone headed for the Georgian capital, Tbilisi. The Georgian government quickly created camps, with basic housing painted in bright colours, to accommodate many of the displaced. These camps are however located away from population centres, and the refugees have little hope of finding work. They live in extreme poverty and their brightly-painted houses are a constant reminder of the war.

After the end of the hostilities, the South Ossetian administration offered the Akhalgori refugees a chance of returning to their homes. A crossing was set up on the administrative border, enabling people to move in either direction. Given the difficult social conditions in the refugee camps, many refugees decided to return to the occupied territory.

The Georgian government made unofficial attempts to stop refugees from Akhalgori District returning to their homes, and when a significant number of them did decide to head back, the government cut off the supply of natural gas to the district.
The Georgian government, however, made unofficial attempts to stop refugees from Akhalgori District returning to their homes. When a significant number of them did decide to head back, the government cut off the supply of natural gas to the district. In the winter, the lack of heating led many of the refugees to go back to the refugee camps and even those who had wanted to go home chose to stay in the camps.

[O]n the night of August 7, when Georgian forces began their rocket and artillery barrage of Tskhinvali, the South Ossetian capital, Brigadier General Mamuka Kurashvili, the chief of Georgian peacekeepers in South Ossetia, went on Georgian television to say Georgia's "power-wielding bodies" had "decided to restore constitutional order" in the breakaway region.

Mr Saakashvili denies ever using those words. He said his forces moved to slow a Russian advance into Georgia in order to "confront them for three days and to wake up the world".

General Kurashvili also did not mention Russian armour.

The dispute is about more than words. Many leaders, including those who strongly back Georgia in its fight with Russia, accuse Mr Saakashvili of having responded to the shelling of Georgian villages by South Ossetian separatists by undertaking a risky attempt to seize control of the region. That led to Russia's well-planned counter-attack and the invasion of Georgia.

In Mr Saakashvili's version, he is blameless for the resulting crisis that has destroyed much of the Georgian military, seen the Russians damage bridges, roads and other infrastructure inside Georgia proper, shaken investor confidence, and left Russia in even firmer control of South Ossetia and Abkhazia, Georgia's other separatist enclave.

"We didn't expect this kind of escalation and invasion," said Mr Saakashvili, who has taken to going to sleep at 6am as he deals with the crisis.

Georgian troops arrived Khetagurovo on Aug. 8 in a storm of steel and bullets, killing eight people and badly damaging the village of ethnic South Ossetians.

When they left two days later, harried by the Russian forces that crushed Tbilisi's bid to restore control over its breakaway region, locals say their took four prisoners with them and forfeited any chance of reconciliation.

Passions were still running high when Thomas Hammarberg, a European human rights official, arrived in the village on Sunday to witness the release of two Georgian tank crew as a goodwill gesture by the Ossetian authorities.

"Why are you releasing these bloody Georgians if they don't release my husband who is held hostage there?," village book keeper Rita Bestayeva shouted at Hammarberg, the Council of Europe's Human Rights Commissioner.

Russian soldiers held angry villagers at bay as the two Georgian servicemen -- captured when Russian troops retook the village -- were whisked away in a car in the direction of Georgia, a gesture Hammarberg said he would use his influence to push Tbilisi to reciprocate.

"I know that it is very difficult for people in this village to accept that those two prisoners have been released," he told reporters during a break in the visit, which was closely chaperoned by the Russian military.

"I respect their reactions but I am convinced that this is a way to secure that those people missing from this village come back as soon as possible," he said.

What remains of Khetagurovo, set in the hills of South Ossetia amid orchards and vineyards, bears the marks of war and the buildings still standing are pockmarked with shrapnel and bullets.

The conflict has left a lasting legacy in the minds of those like pensioner Yuza Khasiyeva, who saw one neighbour lying in his courtyard killed by a shrapnel headwound and another elderly resident lying dead.

The village is surrounded by a ring of ethnic Georgian villages inside South Ossetia, but asked if the two communities could live together after the latest conflict, she snorted:

"Are you mad? It's better to die than live with them."

"My grandparents told me that in the 1920s they were already killing us, so what we see now is already a third wave of their terror against the Ossetians."