Russia is prepared to hold another round of talks with Tbilisi on its military bases in Georgia next week, a Foreign Ministry spokesmen said on Wednesday.

Ambassador-at-large Igor Savolsky will lead a Russian delegation to the talks scheduled for May 23 in Tbilisi, Alexander Yakovenko was quoted by the Itar-Tass news agency as saying.

The talks will focus on a plan that envisages the completion of Russian bases' withdrawal from Georgia in 2008, Yakovenko added.

On Tuesday, the spokesman said, "No agreements on the withdrawal of the Russian bases by the year of 2008 have been reached" by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his Georgian counterpart, Salome Zourabichvili, at their meeting in Warsaw.

Recently, the long-standing dispute over Russian bases between the two former Soviet countries reached new heights, with Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili boycotting last week's lavish VE Day celebrations in Moscow and US President George W. Bush raising the issue with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Russian officials have said they need at least four years to complete the withdrawal, while Georgian officials insist on closing the bases by January 2008.

But Saakashvili Tuesday struck a conciliatory tone in the dispute with Moscow, saying he and Putin were keen to solve the issue.

Source: Xinhua