Georgia handed over three Russian citizens arrested at the South Ossetian administrative border to the Russian side on November 24.

Three Russians construction workers were arrested close to the village of Nikozi on the Georgian side of the administrative border on November 23 for illegally entering the Georgian territory from Russia into South Ossetia.

“We have released them without any preconditions,” Shota Utiashvili, head of the Interior Ministry’s department for information and analysis, said after the three men were handed over to the Russian side with mediation of EU monitors.

Georgian Deputy Foreign Minister, Nino Kalandadze, said on November 24, that the release of the Russian citizens was as an expression of Tbilisi’s “goodwill, although we have all the legal grounds to arrest everyone who illegally crosses the Georgian border.”

Georgia’s law on occupied territories bans entry into breakaway Abkhazia and South Ossetia from any other directions except from the Georgian-controlled territory, otherwise the entry is considered as illegal crossing of the Georgian state border.