http://blogs.tol.org/georgia Sat, 19 Jul 2008 22:38:14 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en All is moved here --- blogs.tol.org/conflicts http://blogs.tol.org/georgia/2008/07/20/we-are-here/ What does President Saakashvili eat for lunch? What does he do before his dinner? And what he plans to do after he retires? Financial Times got answers to these questions and provided insight into the "well-over 6 feet charismatic" leader's views. – salads, olives, two varieties of caviar – ... http://blogs.tol.org/georgia/2008/05/02/lunch-with-saakashvili/ If there are elections in Georgia, you may bet some major scandal will take place with Russia -- most probably over the breakaway regions of Abkhazia or South Ossetia. There was a spy scandal before the elections in 2006; then there was President Saakashvili's brave intervention in a brawl ... http://blogs.tol.org/georgia/2008/04/30/elections-external-tensions/ Saakashvili's party "National Movement" will win the parliamentary elections with a 52-53% of votes in their favor. This is a prediction of course, but any other result is simply hard to imagine. Although it is not because the Presidents' team is popular at the moment -- on the contrary, ... http://blogs.tol.org/georgia/2008/04/27/parliamentary-elections-in-georgia-who-will-be-the-winner/ Georgia's former Defense Minister and Saakashvili's outspoken critic Irakli Okruashvili was granted asylum by the French authorities. Last month, Okruashvili was jailed in absentia for 11 years by the Georgian court on charges of extortion and large scale bribery. To remind, the criminal case was brought against Okruashvili in ... http://blogs.tol.org/georgia/2008/04/26/firebrand-irakli-is-adopted-by-france/ In a surprise twist, the parliament speaker and the leader of the ruling National Movement Nino Burjanadze left the Georgian politics. She was going to top the National movement party list for the upcoming parliamentary elections, but because "it was not possible to reach consensus in the compilation of the ... http://blogs.tol.org/georgia/2008/04/24/burjanadze-leaves-the-national-movement/ Georgia's public defender Sozar Subari  attacked the Central Election Commission for turning a blind eye to the violations during the presidential elections in January 2008. He demanded resignation of the head of the election administration Levan Tarkhnishvili (a demand opposition has been voicing for months). The study of the ... http://blogs.tol.org/georgia/2008/04/17/public-defender-outrage/ Georgia's hopes to gain the NATO Membership Act Plan at the Bucharest summit last week were dashed by a polite refusal from the alliance members. In exchange for the setback, Georgia was promised that the door which was open for it all these years, would now be wide open. ... http://blogs.tol.org/georgia/2008/04/12/map-shmap-and-other-woes/ Strange  misunderstandings take place around the Georgian authorities, especially as of late. "Dialogue", "breakthrough", "unprecedented", "first time in the history" -- are words that pop up daily from the leaders of Saakashvili's administration. Yet, often something comes up to spoils the celebration. One of the recent flops was the ... http://blogs.tol.org/georgia/2008/04/11/uneven-deep-lomacy/ The hunger strike which lasted for 17 days in front of the Georgian Parliament was called off by the opposition on March 25th without any political concessions from the ruling party. The opposition stopped hunger strike after Patriarch for the second time called on the conflicting sides to reach ... http://blogs.tol.org/georgia/2008/03/29/georgian-opposition-stops-hunger-strike/