Moscow/Tbilisi  - Russia military forces turned up the pressure on their Georgian opponents on Tuesday as international diplomats scrambled to bring a ceasefire to the widening war in Ossetia.

The sharpest combat as of Tuesday morning was in the Kodori Gorge in Georgia's west, where Abkhazia infantry and armour began an attack on Georgian defences, according to a Georgian government report.

Paris  - President Nicolas Sarkozy of France, which currently chairs the European Union, was expected to fly to Moscow and then to Tbilisi Tuesday to mediate the crisis over Georgia's breakaway region of South Ossetia, Elysee Palace said.

Sarkozy spoke by telephone with Russian President Dmitri Medvedev twice Monday. He also spoke with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Italian President Silvio Berlusconi about his goal of reaching a ceasefire between Russia and Georgia.

Moscow, Aug 12 : With Russian Army moving into Abkhazia, another breakaway region of Georgia, in an apparent attempt to broaden the conflict over South Ossetia, French President Nicolas Sarkozy will arrive here to undertake a peace plan.

Sarkozy will meet his Russian counterpart Dmitry Medvedev in Kremlin to discuss a French peace plan that Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili signed on Monday as Russian troops moved further into Georgia and casualties mounted outside the breakaway regions that sparked the war.

Washington - Russia's military offensive is designed to oust Georgia's democratically-elected government and intimidate other former Soviet states seeking closer ties to the West, Republican presidential hopeful John McCain said Monday.

"This pattern of attack appears aimed not at restoring any status quo ante in South Ossetia, but rather at toppling the democratically- elected government of Georgia," McCain told reporters on the campaign trail in Erie, Pennsylvania.

Brussels - Russia's ambassador to NATO asked Monday to meet the alliance's top officials over the crisis in Georgia and rejected any criticism of his country's actions, drawing parallels with NATO's bombing raids in Serbia in 1999.

"This morning the Russian mission to NATO made the decision to propose holding an extraordinary session of the NATO-Russia Council. We insist that before NATO make any statements it conduct responsible work to find out the facts," Ambassador Dmitry Rogozin told journalists in Brussels.

Helsinki - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Finnish President Tarja Halonen on Monday discussed the situation in the breakaway region of South Ossetia in Georgia, the Finnish president's office said.

Halonen expressed concern for the situation and called for an immediate end to the fighting saying "there was no military solution" and that humanitarian relief should be channelled to the civilian population, according to a statement issued by the president's office.

The Finnish president backed recent calls for troops to be withdrawn to the positions held before fighting broke out last week.