(TALLINN) - Georgia's Foreign Minister Eka Tkeshelashvili warned Friday against a return to normal relations with Russia until Moscow fully respects the EU-brokered ceasefire which ended their conflict in August.

"It will be very dangerous and shortsighted to return to business-as-usual with Russia unless Russia commits to return its troops to their positions before the Russian invasion of Georgia," Tkeshelashvili told reporters during a visit to Estonia, one of Tbilisi's staunchest allies.

She welcomed Moscow's pull-out from territory it seized during its war with Tbilisi over South Ossetia, a Russian-backed breakaway region of Georgia, but said the process was far from complete.

"There are several Georgian checkpoints still held by the Russian military. Russia should also allow a full access of observers and humanitarian personnel to all Georgian territory," she said.

Estonia, like Georgia, split from the crumbling Soviet Union in 1991, but in marked contrast is now firmly anchored in the West, having joined NATO and the European Union in 2004.

Russian troops and tanks surged into Georgia on August 8 to beat back an overnight Georgian offensive to wrest control of South Ossetia from separatists.

Estonia and a handful of other EU members, mostly ex-communist states, have taken a hard line against Russia over the conflict.

The EU is divided over whether Russia has fulfilled its promise under the ceasefire to pull back from positions in Georgia.

Diplomats say some countries, including Estonia, are insisting Russia must fully withdraw to positions held before the war and reduce troops in South Ossetia and Georgia's other rebel region, Abkhazia, to pre-conflict levels.

But for France and many other member states, the Russian withdrawal from "buffer zones" adjacent to the rebel regions, said to have been completed Wednesday, was the only condition to be fulfilled, diplomats say.

Russia recognised South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent states in August.

Estonian Prime Minister Andrus Ansip, who met with Tkeshelashvili Thursday, said Moscow must be called to account.

"Requesting that Russia respect Georgia's territorial integrity is the red line that we cannot drop," he said.

Tkeshelashvili also spotlighted the on-the-ground legacy of Russia's offensive.

"There are Russian mines left by Russian troops in practically all the places that were occupied by Russian troops after their invasion," she told AFP.

"We would like the Russians to help us locate the areas where they left mines but so far they have declined cooperation," she said.

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