RUSSIANS PULLING OUT OF GORI

The US meanwhile began sending in humanitarian aid, the first tangible results of an American response that Georgia's leader suggests has been confused and naive.

The first shipment arrived on a huge military C-17, a veiled reminder of the close US-Georgia military co-operation that has angered Russia.

Ministry spokesman Shota Utiashvili said that Russian troops, have also left Poti, a Black Sea port city with an oil terminal that is key to Georgia's fragile economic health.

Georgian police on the outskirts of Gori were halting civilian traffic on Thursday morning, and scores of light vehicles carrying Georgian soldiers were parked in the area. The soldiers said they were awaiting further orders.

The Russian troops entered Gori on Wednesday. The city is about 15 miles south of South Ossetia, the separatist Georgian region where Russian and Georgian forces fought a brutal five-day battle.

The entry into Gori came hours after both sides signed a ceasefire agreement that called for their forces to be pulled back to the positions they held before the fighting started a week ago.

The truce allows Russian forces to take unspecified "security measures," raising the possibility they could try to stay in Georgia proper under the justification of protecting their troops in South Ossetia.

Gori was battered by sporadic Russian bombing before the ceasefire, with Russian saying it was targeting a military base near the city. The city sits along the country's only significant east-west road, and the arrival of Russian troops sparked suspicion that Russia would effectively try to cut the country in half.

Gori is about 60 miles west of the capital Tbilisi, and the Russian troops' presence was viewed by many as a demonstration of the vulnerability of the capital to attack.