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Georgia's president, Mikheil Saakashvili has blamed the western military alliance for his country's war with Russia in 2008.

Interviewed by the Russian Vlast magazine the Georgian president (pictured, right, with former US president George W. Bush) said, reports Bloomberg's Business Week, that the decision of NATO to refuse him a "membership action plan" in April 2008 had sent the "wrong signal" to Russian leaders and encouraged them to enact a long planned attack on his country.

The European Union's Tagliavini Commission into the war of August 2008 published their conclusions into who started the conflict in September last year. Blaming Georgia for breaching international law by shelling Tskhinvali in the breakaway province of South Ossetia and so beginning the five days of intense conflict, they also cited Russian provocations and treaty breaches as contributory factors.

President Saakashvili has veered between saying the Commission's report has vindicated him and saying it is a report produced by a team bribed by Russian energy and media giant Gazprom.

The president also said he had a standing invitation to visit US president Barack Obama in Washington DC. Saakashvili's inability or unwillingness to meet western leaders (on his recent trip to London he did not get to see the British Prime Minister) has caused unfavourable comment at home in recent weeks.