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US Vice President Cheney arrives in Tbilisi
Sep 4, 2008, 7:41 GMT
Tbilisi, Georgia - US Vice President Dick Cheney arrived in the capital of Georgia on Thursday in a show of support for the pro- Western government after Russian troops pushed into the former Soviet state in a brief war over its separatist regions.
Cheney is the highest ranking US official to visit Georgia since the fighting in mid-August and his visit is timed with Washington's announcement that it was boosting aid to the former Soviet republic.
The US vice president, a firm critic of Moscow, is due to hold talks with the US educated President Mikheil Saakashvili in the second part of a three-day tour that saw him in Azerbaijan on Wednesday.
After the brief talks, which are set to underline a planned 1 billion dollars of aid to Georgia, Cheney will fly on to Ukraine later Thursday.
The trip, Cheney's first-ever visit to the Georgian capital, marks US interests in East European and Caucasus states that host alternative energy pipelines to Europe bypassing Russia.
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