...who needs invaders?

Hundreds of South Ossetian rebels with some Russian army personnel went house-to-house in villages near Gori. They set houses ablaze and looted buildings, witnesses said.

The body of a man, his mouth caked with blood, lay in a street in the village of Dzardzanis and nearby the body of a bearded man could be seen crushed under an overturned mini-van, an AFP journalist reported.

The Human Rights Watch group said its researchers in South Ossetia had on Tuesday "witnessed terrifying scenes of destruction in four villages that used to be populated exclusively by ethnic Georgians."