MOSCOW, August 3 (RIA Novosti) - The threat of war between Georgia and its breakaway region of South Ossetia is becoming increasingly real, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Sunday.

"The situation in the Georgian-Ossetian conflict area, which sharply aggravated on August 1-2 as a result of mass mortar shelling of residential quarters in Tskhinvali, which claimed human lives, remains extremely explosive. The threat of large-scale combat operations between Georgia and South Ossetia is becoming ever more real," the ministry said on its web site.

South Ossetian authorities on Sunday accused Georgia of moving its troops close to the separatist region's borders, saying that an artillery battalion and two mortar batteries from the 4th motorized brigade of the Georgian Defense Ministry had started movement from the army base in Georgia's eastern town of Gori towards the separatist republic's capital, Tskhinvali.

Georgia rejected the reports as being untrue.