TBILISI -- The head of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) is making an official visit to Georgia with official visit.
OSCE Secretary-General Lamberto Zannier arrived in Tbilisi on March 8 for a three-day visit.
Zannier is scheduled to meet with President Giorgi Margvelashvili, Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili, and Foreign Minister Tamar Beruchashvili, as well as with Georgian lawmakers and other officials.
The Georgian Foreign Ministry said Zannier plans to travel to the administrative boundary separating government-hled territory from breakaway, Russian-backed South Ossetia, and will also visit a settlement of internally displaced persons.
Russia recognized South Ossetia and another breakaway territory, Abkhazia, as independent states after a brief war against Georgia in 2008, and has thousands of troops in the regions.
Russia has tightened its control over South Ossetia and Abkhazia by signing new treaties with them in recent months.