In a move coming almost a year after the bloody conflict in the Georgian breakaway republic South Ossetia, President Eduard Kokoity on Tuesday dismissed the government of Premier Aslanbek Bulazev.

Amidst the highest unemployment in a quarter century, the closing of banks in Georgia, North Carolina and Kansas, whose assets totalled to $1.5-billion yesterday, has brought this year's tally of failures in U. S. to 40.

The European Union on Thursday said it regretted Russia's decision to veto the extension of a United Nations observation mission in Georgia, calling it a blow to stability.

The 27-member bloc "regrets Russia9s decision," made on Tuesday, not to renew the observation mission's mandate in the fragmented country, EU countries said in a joint statement.

Anyone who is not a native of Peach State, will not be shocked when told that drivers in Georgia are not very smart. Just in time for the Memorial Day weekend, according to survey results released this week, Georgia drivers ranked 47th in their knowledge of road rules in the nation.

Georgia has the full right to hold military exercises on its own territory, Georgian Foreign Minister Gregory Vashadze said Monday.

Vashadze made the remarks at a joint news conference with Swedish Foreign Minister Carl Bildt. The two foreign ministers said they discussed bilateral issues as well as Sweden's incoming presidency of the European Union as of July 1.

Last week, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev criticized a planned NATO military exercise in Georgia next month as "muscle-flexing."

Thank God for the economic crisis, says the local man in charge of South Ossetia's reconstruction: it sent Russian investors clamoring to take part in the rebuilding of this tiny Caucasus region - or so he says.

Information is hard to come by in this isolated breakaway state, where European ceasefire monitors and international aid workers have been barred access, but a different picture has leaked in the Russian press.

A US warship docked in Georgia's Black Sea port of Poti on Monday in a marker of support for the post-Soviet state since its war with Russia in August.

Four months after the war it lost to Russia, the Georgian Parliament Thursday charged that the government as well as the military had made serious mistakes in the South Ossetian conflict.