On the eve of the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing, the world's attention was drawn towards the escalation of conflict in Georgia, where President Mikhail Saakashvili launched an aerial bombardment and ground attack on the breakaway region of South Ossetia. The following day, Friday 8 August, images of the spectacular opening ceremony of the Games were overshadowed by live footage of Georgian troops taking control of Tskhinvali, the South Ossetian capital, together with the mobilisation of Russian armed forces into the region. Seeking to justify bombing raids over South Ossetia and throughout greater Georgia, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin spoke of the need to protect the interests of the 70,000 or so people who had accepted the offer of Russian citizenship. In response, Georgia sought to regain control of its disputed territory and called for international support against the presence of the Russian military within its borders. Arguments about the sanctity of Georgia's borders and the principle of territorial integrity were quickly deployed by President Saakashvili: ‘Russia is fighting a war with us in our own territory. This is a clear intrusion on another country's territory. We have Russian tanks on our territory, jets on our territory in broad daylight.’ The intrusion of Russian forces into Georgian territory was denounced on similar grounds by French President Nicolas Sarkozy and United States President George W. Bush respectively: