Russia blames Georgia on South Ossetia

MOSCOW, Nov 14 (Reuters) - Russia's foreign minister today blamed Georgia for stoking the crisis around its breakaway region of South Ossetia by failing to hold ''a normal dialogue'' and harbouring plans to use force against it.

Earlier, the Russian Foreign Ministry, setting itself at odds with the West, voiced backing for an independence referendum in the territory which the European Union has refused to recognise.

''When the centre, the Georgian leadership, does not want to conduct a normal dialogue with a part of its society, this finds expression in some of the society's moods, and specifically in the referendum,'' RIA news agency quoted Sergei Lavrov as saying.

Georgia should work to find a political solution to the problem and abandon its ''apparent plans to develop a possible solution by force'', Lavrov said.

South Ossetia, a sliver of land in the Caucasus mountains that broke with Georgia in the early 1990s after a violent conflict, voted overwhelmingly in the referendum in favour of separation from Tbilisi.

The region has no international recognition but is propped up by Moscow, and many of its people say they would like to be absorbed into the Russian Federation.

The EU's Finnish presidency said yesterday it did not recognise the vote, which ''did not contribute to efforts for peaceful conflict resolution'', and it voiced full support for Georgia's sovereignty within existing borders.

Georgian Prime Minister Zurab Nogaideli has said the referendum is part of a Russian campaign to stoke a war.

The Kremlin says it is Tbilisi, whose relations with Moscow are at rock-bottom, which is dragging the conflict towards bloodshed by building up its military on the separatists' borders.

REUTERS SY LS RAI2139