page_title: Timeline of the Russo-Georgian War
section_title: August 8
hierarchical_section_title: Timeline of the Russo-Georgian War / Detailed timeline / August 8
caption_attribution_description: Demonstration outside the Russian embassy in Tbilisi, Georgia
context_page_description: The Russo-Georgian War broke out in August 2008 and involved Georgia, Russian Federation, South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
context_section_description: Russian news report claims that around 00:53 MSK, Georgian forces were shelling the route along which refugees were fleeing from the city.
  After the midnight, the Georgian government stated that "hundreds" of fighters and military hardware had passed through Roki Tunnel. In the early hours of the morning, President of North Ossetia–Alania, Taimuraz Mamsurov told the Interfax news agency that hundreds of armed "volunteers" from North Ossetia were heading to the battleground.
  Eduard Kokoity said: "The enemy has suffered considerable losses from our forces. Our troops feel confident." Kakha Lomaia, the secretary of the Georgian National Security Council, said on the same day that Russian army units were moving towards the Roki tunnel.
  At about 04:45 MSK, Georgian State Minister for Reintegration Temur Iakobashvili announced that Tskhinvali was nearly surrounded. He said that "we don't desire demolitions or victims, so we again offer the separatist leaders to begin direct talks over ceasefire and de-escalation of the situation in the conflict zone". While before 8 August, more than half of South Ossetian territory was controlled by the Georgian authorities, after capturing five South Ossetian villages Georgia was controlling two-thirds of the South Ossetian territory.
  In the early morning, an unspecified number of Abkhaz troops were sent to the border of the 12 km (7.5 mi) arms limitation zone between Abkhazia and Georgia proper after Abkhaz Security Council had decided so. However, high combat readiness was not yet announced.
  According to Georgia, the Russian forces first entered South Ossetia at 05:30 on 8 August.
  Interfax reported that by 6:00, Abkhazia began moving heavy weaponry and troops towards the Georgian border. President of North Ossetia–Alania, Taimuraz Mamsurov, claimed that a number of Sukhoi Su-25 aircraft of the Georgian Air Force attacked what he described to be a humanitarian aid convoy en route from Vladikavkaz. Mamsurov, who had accompanied the convoy, was unharmed.
  Iakobashvili told Agence France-Presse that Georgian government did not wish "to assault Tskhinvali, but to neutralise separatist positions," and that Georgian troops had captured eight South Ossetian villages. A South Ossetian government website said Tskhinvali was being assaulted by the Georgian military. South Ossetian leader Eduard Kokoity had told Interfax that the Georgian attack on Tskhinvali was a "perfidious and vile" act. By the morning, the South Ossetian authorities had reported at least 15 civilians had been killed as a result of the Georgian shelling. The Georgian minister Temur Iakobashvili said that day that Georgia intended to eliminate "a criminal regime".
  A Georgian TV station Imedi announced that Georgian military was in control of Tskhinvali at 08:25. Another Georgian TV, Rustavi-2 had reported that eight South Ossetian villages (among them Sarabuk, a strategic vantage point on high ground) had been secured by the Georgian forces.
  The Permanent Representative of Russia to the United Nations Vitaly Churkin called an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council at 01:15 (US EST time) where an exchange of accounts was made with the Georgian ambassador. After the meeting, Churkin said that some of the council members would not agree to "the renunciation of the use of force". Churkin claimed he had warned the council about a "Georgian military buildup" in South Ossetia in the past days. He condemned Georgian rejection of the non-use of force against South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
  Around 10:00, Georgia reported that three Russian Su-24 attack aircraft flew into the Georgian airspace. One Su-24 bombed the area near a police station of the town of Kareli and several civilians were wounded. Later that day, the source in the Russian Ministry of Defense told the Russian newspaper Kommersant, "the [Russian] planes attacked only military targets: military base in Gori, airfields in Vaziani and Marneuli, where [Georgian] Su-25 and L-39 airplanes are based, as well as the radar station 40 kilometres from Tbilisi". When asked wh
caption: In the evening of August 8 demonstrations started outside the Russian embassy in Tbilisi where people were protesting against the Russian intervention.
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