Russia says Cheney fanning Georgian aggression

By Tabassum Zakaria and Conor Sweeney

KIEV/MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russia accused the United States on Friday of encouraging Georgian aggression by supporting Tbilisi's NATO membership bid.

U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney, touring southern Caucasus and Black Sea states after the Russian invasion of Georgia, told Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili on Thursday Washington was fully committed to Tbilisi's bid to join the alliance.

"The new promises to Tbilisi relating to the speedy membership of NATO simply strengthen the Saakashvili regime's dangerous feeling of impunity and encourages its dangerous ambitions," Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Andrei Nesterenko told reporters.

Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko, hosting Cheney on Friday, said NATO membership was vital to protect his country, which shares a long land border with Russia and has a large Russian-speaking population.

Moscow sent tanks and troops deep into Georgian territory to prevent what it called genocide when Tbilisi attempted to retake the pro-Russian province of South Ossetia by force on Aug. 7.

The Kremlin subsequently recognised South Ossetia and a second rebel region, Abkhazia, as independent states, drawing strong condemnation from Saakashvili, his U.S. ally and Europe.

Cheney, in Ukraine on Friday, is touring the region to shore up support for U.S. allies Georgia and Azerbaijan, key links in an energy corridor bypassing Russia that transports around one percent of daily world crude oil output from the Caspian Sea.

Ukrainian President Yushchenko has stepped up calls for swift NATO membership following the conflict in South Ossetia, but his political rivals are either cool or openly oppose an alliance that giant neighbour Russia sees as hostile.