Confusion Reigns in the Caucasus

In an impassioned op-ed piece in today's Washington Post, Saakashvili appealed again for immediate Western intervention. "The Russian leadership cannot be trusted -- and this hard reality should guide the West's response. Only Western peacekeepers can end the war," he wrote.

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev met today with leaders from South Ossetia and Abkhazia, and told reporters later, "Russia's position is unchanged. We will support any decisions taken by the peoples of South Ossetia and Abkhazia...and not only do we support it but we will guarantee them both in the Caucasus and throughout the world."

Elsewhere in Georgia today, more reports emerged of the Russian military on the move. Georgian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Nato Chikovani said Russian troops had moved into the Black Sea oil port city of Poti, which they had appeared to leave earlier. They were also in evidence in the inland town of Zugdidi. "The Russian troops are here. They are occupying," Ygor Gegenava, an elderly Zugdidi resident, told an Associated Press Television crew. "We don't want them here. What we need are friendship and good relations with the Russian people."

Meanwhile the second plane of U.S. aid arrived today in Tblisi, carrying cots, blankets and medicine for the refugees displaced by fighting. The U.N. estimates that more than 100,000 people have fled their homes, and many continue to arrive in the capital.

ABC News visited a makeshift refugee center, housed in the former Communist regime's Foreign Ministry building in Tblisi.

"Most of the people there are looking after themselves and sharing what they can find," ABC News producer Angus Hines reports. "There was no one in charge bar a few young Georgian soldiers. There doesn't appear to be any organization by NGOs or the government."

One Georgian woman ABC News spoke to who had fled her village in South Ossetia said that she didn't understand why the Russians had bombed them. "Why are they doing this?" she said. "If they don't like our government, why are we guilty? They can shoot with guns, but why do they use air strikes? Attacks from the air aren't accurate, they kill everyone."