Georgia President Does Not Export Revolution
// But Intends to Destroy the Empire
CIS
Last Friday Georgia President Mikhail Saakashvili announced at the meeting with Georgia General Prosecutor’s Office workers that soon another CIS country would have a revolution and change its authority. The president said that the country would become known on April 22, at the GUUAM summit in Chisinau. Besides that, Georgian leader promised to snatch Abkhazia from the “imperial claws” soon. This statement combined with harsh speeches of other high officials of Georgia have been received by many observers as ground testing for a serious announcement by countries, opposing the Russian monopoly in CIS.
“We have overcome our enemies in Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan, and have one more country on our list,” Saakashvili said at the meeting with Georgia General Prosecutor’s Office workers. He did not specify the country, suggesting it would become known during the GUUAM (an organization formed by Georgia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, and Moldova) summit, which will be held in Chisinau on April 22.
At the same time the Georgian President named among the first priorities of Georgia the need to “snatch Abkhazia from the empire’s claws.” He again did not specify the empire, but mentioned that that empire “had nothing else left to do.” The opposition politicians state that Saakashvili’s announcement was made in view of the visit of U.S. President George Bush to Georgia, scheduled for May.
On the same day the media spread the announcement by Chairman of the Defense and Security Committee Givi Targamadze that Tbilisi allegedly intended to solve the problems of Abkhazia and South Ossetia by force.
Yesterday, Targamadze called “wicked calumny” the Russian media’s statements which attributed him the threat to solve the problems of Abkhazia and South Ossetia in the nearest future by force. “It’s true that we are forming a modern and powerful army. In order to reach peace, one must have powerful army,” he emphasized in his interview to Georgian journalists. “However, Georgia will not be the first one to start any military action in Abkhazia or in South Ossetia. We are exclusively for peaceful settlement of these problems.” According to Targamadze, his words were taken out of context, and were intentionally misrepresented for propaganda purposes.
Nevertheless, independent observers cannot guess why such sharp announcements have been voiced just now. Not so long ago, Saakashvili had been saying time and again that he had no intentions to export the revolution. However, lately, he has been often saying that Georgia’s problems including the restoration of its territory “depended on being freed from Russia and the destruction of imperial structures on post Soviet territory.”
Some observes supposed that these statements were made with hopes of gaining the support of other participants of the GUUAM summit, mainly Ukraine. According to Georgian media the last few days Saakashvili and Viktor Yushchenko have talked on the phone several times. Besides that, Yushchenko plans to visit Georgia in the nearest future, and in link with that, the media has been giving special attention to the subject that one of the main direction of GUUAM activities will be the support of democratic tendencies on the post Soviet territory.
Vladimir Novikov, Tbilisi; Boris Volkhonsky
All the Article in Russian as of Apr. 18, 2005
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