Translated material
Revolution apart
Okruashvili accused Saakashvili of inciting murder
Yesterday, the myth about the eternal unity of the team that removed Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze from power in November 2003 collapsed overnight. This happened just a couple of months before the fourth anniversary of the Rose Revolution. The troublemaker was 33-year-old Irakli Okruashvili , who for many years was considered the president’s closest associate and held government positions as prosecutor general, head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, and ministers of defense and economic development. Now he has returned to politics as a radical oppositionist.The presentation of Irakli Okruashvili’s movement “For a United Georgia” took place in uncomfortable conditions for him. Yesterday, the Georgian Prosecutor General's Office announced the detention of the parliamentary secretary and presidential press speaker Dmitry Kitoshvili on charges of corruption. He is accused of extortion under the pretext of replenishing the coffers of the ruling National Movement. Last October, Kitoshvili, then head of the National Communications Commission, allegedly forced a businessman who owned shares in the cellular communications company Geocell to sell them for a nominal value of $250,000, out of an actual value of $10 million.
Georgian media reported that there were friendly and partnership relations between Kitoshvili and Okruashvili, and such connections of the newly-minted oppositionist now raise serious suspicions in the power structures. A little later, another businessman told law enforcement agencies that Irakli Okruashvili and his associates purchased from him a building for a party office for $1.8 million, while the documents indicate the amount of $250 thousand. This means that Irakli Okruashvili hid from state taxes due from the transaction.
However, after Mr. Okruashvili’s speech yesterday, his detention by law enforcement agencies will look like political persecution. According to the oppositionist, the president suggested that he “liquidate” those he disliked (Okruashvili promised to name names later). Moreover, Saakashvili demanded the release from prison in 2004, when Okruashvili was head of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, of the president’s uncle, UN official Temuri Alasania, who was arrested in Georgia for accepting a bribe in the amount of $200 thousand.
South Ossetia is a special topic for Irakli Okruashvili, a native of these regions, who became famous for his promise to celebrate 2007 in Tskhinvali. To avoid a military outcome to the conflict, in November 2006, Mikheil Saakashvili transferred him from the Ministry of Defense to the Ministry of Economic Development, which Irakli Okruashvili left a week later of his own free will. According to him, Mikheil Saakashvili then showed “helplessness”, “cowardice” and did not dare to make a “historic decision” that would allow the restoration of Tbilisi’s jurisdiction over South Ossetia. Okruashvili also accused the president of not denouncing the agreement on the presence of Russian peacekeepers in Georgia. Okruashvili called the “temporary administration of South Ossetia” created by the president, loyal to Tbilisi, a “fiction”, and its leader Dmitry Sanakoev - a “cartoon character”.
The Georgian public is hungry for new revelations - Okruashvili knows too much. Perhaps he also knows about the details of the mysterious death of Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania, who, according to the official version, was poisoned by carbon monoxide in February 2005. Okruashvili uttered something similar to words of repentance, saying that he was involved in the processes taking place in the country, but now intends to return “the people of Georgia to their sense of self-worth.” In fact, the oppositionist applied to participate in the 2008 presidential elections. He will turn 35 years old - and before that he cannot run for office - in November of next year. The election date has not yet been determined. His movement will definitely take part in the parliamentary elections, which will be held in parallel with the presidential ones.
The head of the parliamentary human rights committee, Elena Tevdoradze, said she was shocked by the revelations. She advised officials and deputies to maintain good relations with her, since she could, on occasion, “provide them with a privileged place at the window” in a prison cell. The ruling party calls Okruashvili's behavior "hysterical." The ideologist of the National Movement, deputy Giorgi Bokeria, called the accusations of Irakli Okruashvili “dirty insinuations” of an “absolutely degraded person.” Some experts believe that the split in the team of revolutionaries will not stop there. The leader of the opposition Republican Party, David Usupashvili, predicts the imminent transition of parliamentary chairman Nino Burjanadze to the opposition.
In an interview with Vremya Novostey, the head of the opposition Union of Traditionalists, ex-chairman of the Georgian Parliament Akaki Asatiani said that he expects a “serious split in Georgian society.” He laid the blame for what was happening on “the American mentors of Mikheil Saakashvili, who did not take into account that we are not Guatemala or Nicaragua. Self-awareness will definitely awaken in Georgia, and here at least they will not tolerate Mikheil Saakashvili for long. As for Irakli Okruashvili, he still has there is a chance to atone for your sins."