GENEVA, Nov 2, 2009 (AFP) - A UN rights expert will visit the Moscow-backed rebel region of South Ossetia this week to examine the situation of thousands of people displaced in Georgia's brief war with Russia, the UN said Monday.
Walter Kaelin, the representative of the secretary general on the rights of internally displaced persons, will visit South Ossetia's capital Tskhinvali on Thursday and Friday, the United Nations said in a statement.
He is expected to meet people who fled Georgia and Russia's August 2008 conflict over South Ossetia, as well as those displaced since the 1990s in the region, it added.
Kaelin is also due to meet local officials.
The UN expert will report back to the Human Rights Council in March 2010.
In the immediate aftermath of the conflict, the UN refugee agency said some 158,600 people had fled their homes.
They included 98,600 in Georgia, while about 30,000 were displaced in the breakaway Georgian region and another 30,000 in Russia.
Since their war, Russians and Georgians have held a series of talks in Geneva aimed at easing tensions over South Ossetia and another rebel Georgian region, Abkhazia, including humanitarian concerns for the displaced.
The talks are mediated by the United Nations, European Union and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
Thousands of Russian troops are now stationed in the two regions, which Moscow says are needed to protect against Georgian attacks but which Tbilisi calls an illegal occupation.
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