Georgia’s perhaps reckless sabre-rattling is in serious danger of backfiring. Not only can President Mikhail Saakashvili not rely on President Bush to have his back, he can’t even rely on the EU to behave as an honest broker between Tblisi, Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Moscow.
Last week at the UN, apparently Saakashvili kicked things up a notch, by naming names in his campaign to blame Russia for all of Georgia’s problems. But there is more to the situation, as Joshua Keating neatly summarizes:
Meanwhile, his government was engaging in some fairly Putinesque behavior back home. Saakashvili’s saber-rattling speech came just days after his former Interior and Defense Minister Irakli Okruashvili accused him of ordering political assassinations and exhibiting “fascist tendencies.” Saakashvili dismissed these charges as “unpardonable lies.” Then, after announcing that he was forming an opposition party, Okruashvili was arrested Thursday on corruption charges. On Friday, 5,000 protesters gathered in support of Okruashvili in downtown Tbilsi, the largest demonstrations in the city since the 2003 Rose Revolution that brought Saakashvili to power.
None of this means Russia hasn’t behaved atrociously in Georgia’s provinces, or that Okruashvili isn’t corrupt. It just means Saakashvili is not the paragon of virtue and democracy the “color revolution” crowd elevated him to a few years ago. If he was, then these charges would not have come out just when Okruashvili announced the formation of an opposition party.
So Georgia continues to churn along. Maybe it will settle down a bit soon, after the next election. Or we’ll see another epic crowd take to the streets. Either way, it will be worth noting.
Title explanation here.
This post was written by...
Joshua Foust – author of 1801 posts on Registan.net.
Joshua Foust is a Fellow at the American Security Project and the author of Afghanistan Journal: Selections from Registan.net. His research focuses primarily on Central and South Asia. Joshua is a correspondent for The Atlantic and a columnist for PBS Need to Know. Joshua appears regularly on the BBC World News, Aljazeera, and international public radio. Joshua is also a regular contributor to Foreign Policy’s AfPak Channel, and his writing has appeared in the New York Times, Reuters, and the Christian Science Monitor. Follow him on twitter: @joshuafoust
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{ 1 comment }
There is a political crisis brewing in Georgia. Finally, the opposition united, more protests are promised to come.
Two wide theories on what is happening:
1- Okruashvili knew that he was going to be arrested and established a political party to gain immunity – theory advanced by the acting government.
2- Okruashvili is a political prisoner, had he not raised the scandal, he would not be touched – the opposition’s stance.
There is one thing certain through: if Okruashvli knew that he was going to be arrested, he could have simply stayed in another country. If he indeed broke the law, he must have been arrested a long time ago, and not 2 days after his sensational declarations.
Government obviously made a huge mistake. Besides, if Okruashvili indeed possess proof backing his accusations, he can always disclose it during his imprisonment.