(BERLIN) - German Chancellor Angela Merkel is calling for a summit of Georgia's neighbours in the volatile Caucasus region following the recent conflict with Russia, a government spokesman said Saturday.

Russia itself was not on the list of countries envisaged by Merkel -- which included Armenia, Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan -- but no country should be excluded from participating, the spokesman said.

"It's up to the French presidency of the EU to decide if this conference will take place, as well as when and who will be invited," he said.

The summit call comes as Berlin sharpened its tone against Moscow, demanding Saturday that "Russia accomplish without delay the retreat" in Georgia, in line with a six-point ceasefire plan signed by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev last week.

"The German government is waiting for the remaining troops to also retreat from the zone south of South Ossetia and that they be replaced as quickly as possible by an international mechanism," government spokesman Thomas Steg said in a statement.

According to the latest edition of German weekly Der Spiegel, which will be published on Monday, Merkel proposed the summit idea to French President Nicolas Sarkozy, whose country holds the European Union's rotating presidency. Berlin reckons the theme of the summit should be "reconstruction and stability in Georgia and the region," the German government spokesman said.

Merkel begins a tour of Sweden and the Baltic states on Monday, hoping to mend damaging differences in Europe's response to the Georgia crisis and over future relations with Moscow.

The German leader has been firm in demanding Russia withdraw its troops from Georgia proper and made it clear that she takes a dim view of Moscow's recent actions.

But she had also made a point of visiting Russia for talks with Medvedev during the conflict and saying that the lines of communication must remain open.

Russian troops poured into Georgia on August 8, initially to repulse a Georgian assault against Moscow-backed separatists in the South Ossetia region, then moving quickly to occupy areas beyond.

The troops began pulling out from parts of Georgia on Friday, but a top general said hundreds of soldiers would remain deep inside the country along the main strategic highway.

Russia says 500 "peacekeepers" are to remain in a buffer zone around South Ossetia. An unknown number of troops also remain inside South Ossetia as well as Abkhazia, which both broke away from Tbilisi in the 1990s.

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