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Soldiers line streets in Georgian state of emergency
2007-11-08
A ring of soldiers cordoned off central Tbilisi on Thursday after Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili declared a state of emergency and shut down independent media to quash six days of anti-government protests. Opposition leaders said they were suspending protests to avoid more injuries. Over 550 demonstrators were treated in hospital on Wednesday after the government sent in riot police, who beat them with batons, fired rubber bullets and sprayed tear gas. "We don't know where half the opposition leaders are, they were dispersed," protest leader and former foreign minister Salome Zurabishvili told Reuters. Saakashvili justified the police action by saying neighboring Russia was stirring trouble and he expelled three Russian diplomats from Georgia. Schools and colleges were closed until next week and protests were restricted. Human rights groups and the Georgian Orthodox church said the president's actions were inexcusable. Saakashvili faces his worst crisis since he came to power in a bloodless revolution in 2003. A close U.S. ally, he has attempted to portray his small former Soviet state as a beacon of democracy and stability in the volatile Caucasus region -- an image which now lies in tatters. "Georgians have a right to protest peacefully without being beaten by the police," said U.S.-based Human Rights Watch in a statement. "Firing rubber bullets at peaceful demonstrators is a complete abuse of the use of force." Saakashvili wants to take Georgia -- an east-west oil transport link wedged between Russia and the Middle East -- into NATO and the European Union. But opponents have criticized him for an authoritarian style that brooks no dissent, for continuing human rights abuses and for failing to tackle poverty and unemployment. INTERNATIONAL CONCERN In a sign of increasing international concern, the U.S. State Department called on the government and the opposition to avoid actions that could lead to further violence and the European Union sent its top envoy for the region to Georgia. Army trucks and hundreds of soldiers blocked side roads leading into Tbilisi's main street on Thursday, allowing only a handful of people through onto the normally thronged road. Litter covered the quiet streets where hours earlier police had fired tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannon at protesters. "I look at the policemen and see that they cannot look into people's eyes because they are ashamed," Tbilisi resident Keti Tavadze said as she stood near a line of soldiers and police. Armed police on Wednesday stormed the main opposition broadcaster and took it off the air, forcing staff to the ground and holding guns to their heads. All independent television news programs have been halted for the 15-day state of emergency. U.S.-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty told Reuters that the authorities had also knocked its Georgian-language programs off the airwaves. Prime Minister Zurab Nogaideli said authorities had prevented a coup and Saakashvili said he had evidence that Russian intelligence had been organizing the opposition. Protest leaders dismissed the charges as absurd, saying they mostly shared Saakashvili's pro-Western foreign policy stance. Relations between Georgia and Russia were already at all-time lows. Saakashvili's desire to join NATO and his drive to regain sovereignty over two breakaway pro-Russian provinces have angered Moscow, which last year cut all transport links. "We cannot let our country become the stage for dirty geo-political escapades by other countries," Saakashvili told the nation in a television broadcast on Wednesday. "Our democracy needs the firm hand of the authorities." The Kremlin called Saakashvili's accusations "anti-Russian hysterics" and Moscow said it would make "an adequate response," signaling possible tit-for-tat expulsions. (Additional reporting by James Kilner, Writing by Michael Stott; Editing by Dominic Evans)
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