TBILISI — President Saakashvili of Georgia said Russia is responsible for the destruction of an unarmed aircraft in Georgian airspace Sunday and that he has “clear proof” of Russia’s involvement.

“A Russian jet from the Gudauta military base attacked an unmanned Georgian plane in the Ganmukhuri region” of Georgia, Mr. Saakashvili said yesterday in televised remarks. “We have clear video footage showing that Russia carried out this aggressive attack.” The Georgian leader said he spoke with President Putin of Russia by telephone and demanded that Russia cease attacks on Georgian territory and reverse a decision to develop economic and legal ties with Abkhazia and another breakaway region, South Ossetia. Mr. Putin “expressed disbelief” to Mr. Saakashvili “that the Georgian side had undertaken flights for military aims over the conflict zone,” the presidential press service said in a statement sent by email. Mr. Putin said such flights go against the “letter and spirit” of the 1994 cease-fire agreement.

Abkhazia, whose capital Sukhumi is located about 62 miles from Sochi, the Russian Black Sea resort city that will host the 2014 Winter Olympics, broke away from Georgia in a war in the early 1990s. It has asked Russia and the United Nations to recognize its independence.

Mr. Saakashvili has accused Russia of backing the separatist regime in Abkhazia, which has a pro-Russian leadership and Russian peacekeepers. Mr. Saakashvili has pledged to bring the region back under central control. Most of its citizens hold Russian passports. Mr. Putin on April 16 ordered his government to protect the “rights, freedoms, and lawful interests” of Russians living in Abkhazia and South Ossetia and to cooperate with the regions’ “actual governing bodies.”

The Russian air force denied that a Russian jet had destroyed the Georgian aircraft, the Interfax news service reported.

An air force spokesman, Alexander Drobyshevsky, said Russian pilots had the day off on April 20, when the incident took place, Interfax said. He said “not a single Russian air force plane” was in the air over the North Caucasus region on that day, the news service said.

A foreign minister of Abkhazia, Sergei Shamba, said Sunday that Abkhaz forces shot down the Georgian plane. Abkhazia previously said it destroyed a spy drone on March 18, a claim Georgia dismissed as “deliberate disinformation.”

The Deputy Foreign Minister of Georgia, Grigol Vashadze, told reporters earlier that the attack is part of a “step-by-step” plan to annex the Georgian breakaway region of Abkhazia. The Soviet-era Gudauta base is located on Abkhazia’s Black Sea coast.