RUKHI, Georgia (AP): Russian forces turned over 12 Georgian soldiers on the border of one of the separatist provinces under Russian control on Thursday after the short war that outraged the West and brought Moscow's military deep into Georgia.

The release along the Inguri River separating Abkhazia from Georgia proper was a small conciliatory gesture amid the high tensions and belligerent posturing of the weeks following the end of the fighting.

The soldiers, who were detained Aug. 18 in the seaport of Poti, appeared unharmed and some were smiling.

Russian troops remain at checkpoints well into Georgia, saying that a cease-fire agreement allows them to occupy ``security zones'' outside Abkhazia and South Ossetia.

The war started Aug. 7 when Georgian forces launched a massive barrage on South Ossetia's capital, Tskhinvali, only to be quickly driven out by Russian troops.

Russia on Tuesday recognized both republics as independent, a move denounced in Georgia and abroad. The regions make up roughly 20 percent of Georgia's territory _ and include miles of prime coastline along the Black Sea.

Criticized by the west, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev traveled to Dushanbe, the capital of Tajikistan, to ask China and other members of an Asian security group to sign a declaration of support Thursday for Russia's role in the conflict in Georgia.

Yet Russia's hopes of international support for its actions in Georgia were dealt a huge blow when the Asian security alliance denounced the use of force and called for respect for every country's territorial integrity.

A joint declaration from the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, or SCO, deepens Russia's international isolation over its military action, which was blasted in the West for being disproportionate.

Medvedev had appealed to the alliance _ which consists of Russia, China, Kazakhstan and three Central Asian countries of Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan _ for unanimous support of Russia's response to Georgia's ``aggression.''

Medvedev's appeal had raised fears in Western capitals of the emergence of a competing strategic alliance to NATO forming around Russia _ but the other Asian nations may have been reluctant to strain their relations with Europe and the United States.

Medvedev also discussed the situation in Georgia's breakaway regions with Chinese President Hu Jintao. China has traditionally been wary of supporting separatist movements, mindful of its own problems with Tibet and Muslims in the western territory of Xinjiang.

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Qin Gang was quoted by state news agency Xinhua as saying ``the situation in the region ... should be resolved in dialogue.''

Moscow said NATO's plans for expansion and Western support for Georgia had caused the new East-West divisions, and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin lashed out at the United States for using military ships to deliver humanitarian aid to Georgia.

Aggravating the tensions, South Ossetia on Thursday claimed to have shot down an unmanned Georgian spy plane that was scouting the skies over the republic. Georgia's Interior Ministry denied the report.

The tensions have spread to the Black Sea, which Russia shares unhappily with three nations that belong to NATO and two others that desperately want to, Ukraine and Georgia. Some Ukrainians fear Moscow might set its sights on their nation next.

In moves evocative of Cold War cat-and-mouse games, a U.S. military ship carrying humanitarian aid docked at a southern Georgian port, and Russia sent a missile cruiser and two other ships to a port farther north in a show of force.

The maneuvering came a day after Medvedev had said his nation was ``not afraid of anything, including the prospect of a Cold War.'' For the two superpowers of the first Cold War, the United States and Russia, repercussions from this new conflict could be widespread.

Russia's agriculture minister said Moscow could cut poultry and pork import quotas by hundreds of thousands of tons, hitting American producers hard. A key civil nuclear agreement between Moscow and Washington also appears likely to be shelved until next year at the earliest.

Britain's top diplomat equated Moscow's offensive in Georgia with the Soviet tanks that invaded Czechoslovakia to crush the Prague Spring democratic reforms in 1968, and demanded Russia ``change course.''

``The sight of Russian tanks in a neighboring country on the 40th anniversary of the crushing of the Prague Spring has shown that the temptations of power politics remain,'' Foreign Secretary David Miliband said.

The Kremlin rejected Western criticism, and late Tuesday even suggested the conflict could spread. It starkly warned another former Soviet republic, tiny Moldova, that aggression against a breakaway region there could provoke a military response.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy accused Russia of trying to redraw the borders of Georgia. His foreign minister went further, suggesting Russia had engaged in ``ethnic cleansing'' in South Ossetia, one of the two Georgian rebel territories.

Georgia's prime minister put damage from the Russian war at about US$1 billion but said it did not fundamentally undermine the Georgian economy. Georgia, which has a national budget of about US$3 billion, hopes for substantial Western aid.

The United Nations has estimated nearly 160,000 people had to flee their homes, but hundreds have returned to Georgian cities like Gori in the past week.

In the Black Sea, the U.S. Coast Guard cutter Dallas, carrying 34 tons of humanitarian aid, docked in Batumi. The missile destroyer USS McFaul was there earlier this week delivering aid, and the U.S. planned to leave it in the Black Sea for now.

In the Georgian capital of Tbilisi, boxes of aid were sorted, stacked and loaded onto trucks Wednesday for some of the tens of thousands of people still displaced by the fighting. Some boxes were stamped ``USAID _ from the American People.''