On the eve of a European Union report on who started the Russia-Georgia war, EU monitors said Tuesday that they have stepped up patrols in Georgia to keep tensions from boiling over into violence.

The August 2008 war ended with Russian soldiers driving Georgian forces out of the separatist regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. Russia now keeps thousands of troops in the regions and recognizes them as independent states.

Russia, in apparent violation of the EU-brokered peace agreement, has not allowed EU monitors into the two regions, and tensions persist along their boundaries with the rest of Georgia.

The head of the EU’s 200-member mission in Georgia said the borders were largely quiet. “We hope it will remain the same” after the EU report is released Wednesday, mission head Hansjörg Haber said. “We have made our little contribution by reinforcing our patrols and our visibility” over the past week.

The EU-commissioned report, written by Swiss diplomat Heidi Tagliavini, is expected to lay blame for the war with both sides — an outcome the EU hopes will ease regional tensions, according to EU officials who spoke on condition of anonymity due to the sensitivity of the issue.

One EU official said she expected the EU report to say Georgia started the war, but Russia drove Tbilisi to the brink and exploited the situation afterward.

“Conditions have often been like that between Georgia and its big brother,” said the official, who is involved in EU-Russia relations and human rights issues.

Another EU official said both sides had shown shortcomings, including a failure to prevent the conflict.

Russia’s envoy to NATO rejected Western allegations that Russia used disproportionate force during the war — an issue the EU report is expected to raise. Dmitry Rogozin insisted Russia’s use of force was measured.

“If the response was actually disproportionate, I think that our troops would be standing in Tbilisi,” he said.

For weeks rumors have suggested the report would also criticize Georgia for some of the fighting. “I have no reason to disbelieve that,” said European Parliament lawmaker Richard Howitt, an expert on EU-Russia relations. “The inquiry was a genuinely open one to find the real evidence.”