(Adds Abkhaz denial) TBILISI, Sept 21 (Reuters) - A Georgian police officer was shot dead and two others were wounded on Sunday near the de facto border with breakaway Abkhazia, the third such killing since the Georgia-Russia war in August. The Georgian Interior Ministry blamed Abkhaz separatists, who it said had opened fire on police in the village of Khurcha from within Abkhazia. The self-styled Abkhaz government denied involvement. The officer was the third to be killed in shootings near Georgia's two breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia since Russian forces drove the Georgian army from South Ossetia in a five-day war in August. "There was no shooting, nor could there have been any shooting," the Abkhaz regional representative in nearby Gali, Ruslan Kishmaria, told Russian Interfax news agency. A Georgian police officer was killed in the same region on Sept 13, prompting Georgia to replace border guards with elite police units. Russian forces still hold positions along 'security zones' adjacent to South Ossetia and along parts of the Abkhaz border. They are due to pull back by Oct. 10, within 10 days of the announced deployment of 200 European Union observers. Earlier this month, a Georgian police officer was shot dead near a Russian checkpoint at the entrance to the South Ossetia buffer zone. Georgia blamed Russian forces but Moscow denied involvement. Both Abkhazia and South Ossetia threw off Georgian rule in wars in the early 1990s. Russia recognised them as independent states after repelling a Georgian offensive to retake South Ossetia from pro-Moscow separatists, and said it would station around 7,600 soldiers in both regions. (Reporting by Margarita Antidze and Matt Robinson; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
Relatives of Major Shalva Dolidze, a commander of 1st Battalion of 4th Brigade of Georgian Army killed in the conflict with South Ossetia, attend a memorial service at the cemetery in ...
