Russian President Dmitry Medvedev made a surprise visit Monday to South Ossetia, the rebel region at the heart of a war with Georgia last year, where officials said he was welcomed warmly by locals.
Georgia however instantly condemned the trip, with President Mikheil Saakashvili calling it "shameful" and linking it to a deal signed earlier in the day in Ankara on a new gas supply route for Europe bypassing Russia.
Medvedev's visit was not announced in advance by the Kremlin and came less than a month ahead of the first anniversary of a conflict that remains a source of high tension in the region.
The brief war in August last year ended with Russia formally recognising South Ossetia and another rebel Georgian region, Abkhazia, as independent states, though no other country except Nicaragua has followed suit.
Medvedev was welcomed with a wooden cup of beer, skewered meat and three traditional cheese pies in accordance with local custom, said Irina Gagloyeva, spokeswoman for the South Ossetian separatist authorities.
"How else can you greet the man who saved the republic?" said another local government spokeswoman.
According to the website of the local government which is supported by the Kremlin, scores of local residents greeted Medvedev with a "loud, long ovation" in the central square of South Ossetia's main city, Tskhinvali.
No independent account of the visit was immediately available.
On arrival, Medvedev went into talks with the breakaway republic's leader Eduard Kokoity, telling him that his first visit to South Ossetia since the war was meant to strengthen Russia's ties with the region.
"Thank you very much for inviting me to visit the new country, South Ossetia, which emerged as a result of difficult dramatic events and which the Russian people truly supported during a difficult moment," Medvedev said, according to comments published on the local government's website.
Medvedev said Russia intended to help the region revive its economy and improve social conditions.
"There's also the need to keep up cooperation in the defence area," Medvedev added.
The Kremlin said Medvedev visited a Russian military base in Tskhinvali, where he inspected military vehicles, barracks and a canteen. Such visits are usually off limits to foreign journalists.
Saakashvili responded angrily to the Medvedev visit.
"It is one of the most shameful pages in Russia's history," the Georgian leader said in Ankara, where he was attending ceremonies marking the signature by four European states of the Nabucco gas pipeline project.
Referring to the visit, he added, according to a spokesman in Tbilisi: "I don't know whether it is a response to Nabucco, which Russian diplomacy sees as a deceit, or to President Obama's recent statements in Moscow."
On a visit last week to Moscow, President Barack Obama made clear that the United States opposed Russia's decision to recognise South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent countries.
South Ossetia, a rugged region on the south side of the Caucasus mountains that is still largely in ruins as a result of last year's war, remains a major sticking point between Russia and the West.
Russian forces moved into Georgia on August 8, 2008, to repel a Georgian military attempt to retake the rebel province, whose breakaway administration had long enjoyed extensive support from Moscow.
Russia has since stationed thousands of soldiers in South Ossetia as well as Abkhazia.
South Ossetia broke off from the rest of Georgia in fighting in the early 1990s and received Russian backing for years before Moscow's recognition of its independence last August.
Georgia insists the region remains an integral part of its territory and is backed in its claim by the West.
