.

President Saakashvili admitted that, in the short term, Russia had made territorial gains and the cost to Georgia of this summer's conflict had been dire.

But the consequences he said had not been deadly and Georgia would recover.

"Remember Russia did not get two of its goals," he said, "to destroy our government or to shut off the pipeline which is the main energy bloodline for Europe."

He said Georgia's priority now was to rebuild its economy and strengthen its democracy.

Competition of principles

"We can never outwit Russia with tanks," he observed, "but we can compete on principles."

Mr Saakashvili has not shifted in his insistence that it was a Russian invasion which had started the conflict over South Ossetia, and Georgia had only acted in response - a view diametrically opposed to Russia's reading.

way to a more seasoned assessment of what happened.

He refused to be riled by the Russian president's description of him as "unhinged".

"President Dmitry Medvedev has called me a 'political corpse'," he noted wryly, "but this corpse is here at the United Nations, holding talks and having meetings. I think some of these overstatements are counter-productive. There is no alternative to dialogue, but this will take time and a change of mentality in the Kremlin."

The Georgian president is not the only one at the gathering of world leaders at the UN General Assembly who has been taking stock of where this summer's conflict in the Caucasus has left international relations.

Among foreign ministers from Europe, suspicions of Russia's motive and concern at what it might do next remain high.