Georgia: Tensions Over Human Rights-Related Issues
Note: Saakashvili has other domestic dilemmas.
Azerbaijan is not that happy with Georgia.
While Georgia is striving to restore control over its northern separatist province of South Ossetia, tension is brewing in its predominantly Azeri southern districts. Local residents blame the Georgian president for failing to deliver on pre-election pledges to improve social conditions in the region. The situation has sparked concerns in neighboring Azerbaijan, where voices are rising in defense of Georgia's largest Muslim minority. #msg-3641789
And Chechnya’s kavkazcenter is starting to criticize Saakashvili. Georgia: Saakashvili attacks Chechen women
Most likely, after Georgian president Saakashvili did not get too lucky in South Ossetia, he decided to show how tough he is by sending Georgian troops against Chechen women and children. http://kavkazcenter.com/eng/article.php?id=3052
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SAAKASHVILI AND THE NGO SECTOR: TENSIONS OVER HUMAN RIGHTS-RELATED ISSUES John Mackedon: 8/11/04
Georgia's Rose Revolution is going through a turbulent period. President Mikheil Saakashvili's efforts to restore Georgia's territorial integrity have caused tension to rise in the separatist regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. At the same time, discontent over Saakashvili's governing style is building in Tbilisi.
International attention is focused on how Saakashvili handles the challenges presented by South Ossetia and Abkhazia. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].
Less publicized, though no less important for Georgia's democratization process, is Saakashvili's approach to domestic political dilemmas. While trying to reestablish Tbilisi's authority in separatist regions, Saakashvili is simultaneously waging a vigorous domestic struggle to stamp out corruption and firmly establish the rule of law. In pursuing those lofty goals, however, critics contend that the president is using authoritarian means.
Representatives of Georgia's non-governmental sector are among the most vocal critics of Saakashvili's domestic practices - an ironic twist given that Saakashvili relied heavily on the NGO sector in his successful drive to force former president Eduard Shevardnadze from power last November. A significant number of top officials now serving in Saakashvili's administration were prominent civil society actors during the Shevardnadze era. The presence of such officials in government, however, has not been able to squelch the concern over the administration's actions.
An open letter issued in early July by the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH) to Javier Solana, a top European Union official, expressed concern about a "gap" in the Saakashvili administration's statements on human rights and its actual practices. The letter went on to voice concern over recently adopted constitutional amendments "that have challenged the republican-style balance of powers" by increasing Saakashvili's authority. It also accused the Saakashvili administration of various rights violations. To help support the assertion, the letter cited a July 1 incident in which security forces used force to break up a sit-in at Tbilisi City Hall being carried out by earthquake victims seeking disaster relief.
In addition, FIDH accused Georgian officials of failing to protect the rights of those accused of crimes. "The increasing number of [cases of] torture, inhuman and humiliating treatment, as well as arbitrary detentions also remain matters of deep concern for FIDH," the letter said.
Controversy has continued to build in August, with Saakashvili facing accusations of trying to stifle press freedom. An incident that galvanized presidential critics was the August 2 arrest of Revaz Okruashvili, the editor of the newspaper Khalkhis Gazeti, on drug possession charges. Okruashvili's newspaper has published articles highly critical of Saakashvili's policies. He was released under a "procedural agreement" reached between the defendant and Georgian prosecutors, the Kavkasia-Press news agency reported August 6.
During a public appearance on August 5 in Washington, Saakashvili rejected criticism about the free-speech climate in Georgia. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive].
In a July interview with the British Broadcasting Corp, Saakashvili acknowledged the dissatisfaction with his methods, but he scoffed at the notion that he was taking Georgia in an authoritarian direction. "Although things are not perfect, we are developing," Saakashvili said. "Free media and fair elections rule out the existence of a dictatorial regime."
At home, Saakashvili has not shied away from confronting criticism raised by local NGO activists. Referring to the violent dispersal of the July 1 sit-in, Saakashvili told NGO representatives in a recent speech that the government had a right "not to allow the blocking of the entrance of the Mayor's office…or the paralysis of government entities." The president did, however, go on to concede that "the government should not use excessive force to prevent this." Saakashvili also stressed in the speech that "mechanisms of cooperation with you [the NGO sector] are a special channel for us, for our government."
Allegations of improper treatment of prisoners have proven more problematic for the president. A case that helped stir the torture controversy involved Sulkhan Molashvili, the former chairman of the State Audit Agency, who claimed that he was burned with cigarettes and subjected to electric shocks while in official custody on corruption charges. Officials have vehemently denied torturing Molashvili, but NGO representatives appear to treat the government's statements with skepticism. "It makes no difference whether or not he [Molashvili] is guilty, the government should employ all procedural norms, and this does not include torture," said Zaza Rukhadze, a representative of the Georgian Young Lawyers Association.
Further complicating the issue, the new Minister of Justice, Giorgi Papuashvili, abolished a commission responsible for monitoring conditions in the Georgian penal system. The commission was created during Saakashvili's stint as justice minister in Shevardnadze's administration. [For additional information see the Eurasia Insight archive].
The decision provoked an outcry from NGO activists. "The former head of the Justice Department in Shevardnadze's regime [Roland Giligashvili] attempted to abolish this [monitoring council], but he failed. But Papuashvili was able to do it," said Nana Kakabadze, head of the group Former Political Prisoners for Human Rights and one of Saakashvili's harshest critics.
In an effort to ease the criticism coming from the NGO sector, Saakashvili in early August issued a decree restoring the monitoring council. This commission, comprising 21 members from various NGO and Civil Society groups, will submit quarterly reports to the Justice Ministry and bi-annual reports to the president concerning rights conditions in the country's prison system.
Editor's Note: John Mackedon is a Tbilisi-based writer. He works for the on-line publicatin Civil Georgia, and formerly served as a Peace Corps volunteer in the country.
This, if true, could give Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych the advantage to overcome the strong presidential campaign of former Prime Minister Viktor Yushchenko.
The better the Georgian revolution evolves in practice and in its dealings with Russia, the better the attitude of Russians will be toward Yushenko, who is typically assigned the role of the Saakashvili of Ukraine. But if Saakashvili continues down lines of confrontation and exacerbation of Georgian nationalism -- lines being compared in Russia to the first Georgian democrat-president, Gamsakhurdia -- then it will sour Russians not only on him but on Yushenko. And it will sour not only Russians but millions of Ukrainians, who would dread a similar downward spiral in relations with
Russia. We should bear in mind that a large majority of Ukrainians are pro-Russian: The personal ties are intimate, and a pro-Russian image has been the key to winning presidential elections in Ukraine.
The interest of the U.S. is for the positive variant to succeed: for Georgia to build a good relation with Russia, and for Russia and pro-Russian Ukrainians to take a more hopeful view of Yushenko. One Russian business newspaper has called, wistfully, for a reconsideration of Yushenko as potentially a good thing because a domestic reformer. Other Russians have argued that Yushenko has already lost and backed himself into an anti-Russian cul de sac where he cannot get much more than his 25 percent core vote.
The United States has placed considerable stakes on Yushenko and on Saakashvili. The U.S. also has stakes in Russia -- far greater stakes, in fact.
News Flash: Kuchma resignation rumored – “Yeltsin variant” By Peter Lavelle Published on August 21, 2004
Thanks to Ben for sending the following along – more on this story Monday.
Source: Inside Ukraine Newsletter, Kyiv, Ukraine, Sat, August 21, 2004
KYIV - Rumours thought to have originated among the Russian press suggest that Ukrainian President Kuchma may be on the verge of announcing his pre-term resignation, to take effect almost immediately after Ukraine's Independence Day, August 24, 2004. The rumours are so specific as to suggest that the Kuchma announcement has already been recorded and will be held in Presidential Administration hands until it would be broadcast by all major television stations on Monday.
Should the rumoured Kuchma resignation come to pass, it would closely mimic the resignation of Russian President Boris Yeltsin that brought Vladimir Putin to power. Just as it was in Russia, Ukrainian law prescribes that in case of the resignation of a sitting president the prime minister would become acting president for 60 days during which time an election would be held to elect a new president for a full term.
In Kuchma's case, with the regular presidential election slated for October 31, a resignation in late August would only shorten his term by a little over two months and might, at the same time, prove an immense advantage to the chances of Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych to overcome the strong presidential campaign of former Prime Minister Viktor Yushchenko.
With all the powers of the presidency at his disposal and with the existence of a several billion hryvna war chest of government funds at his disposal, allegedly secreted there in the 2004 budget process, available for what are expected to be considerable raises in the pay of government employees and the retirement payments of pensioners, Yanukovych would be expected to become an almost unstoppable force for election to a full term.
The election of Yanukovych, with his known record of criminal convictions and prison terms, and his highly authoritarian Soviet style of rule, clearly demonstrated during his years in power as governor of the eastern Ukrainian industrial heartland, Donetsk Oblast, will not sit well with many government leaders in Europe and the United States.
However, opprobrium in the wider world seems to the Ukrainian power elite to be a small price to pay for a smooth transition of power to a known quantity like Yanukovych, particularly when the deal also almost certainly includes certainty that neither Kuchma nor any of his close political associates will ever be required to face court action for their alleged misdeeds over the past 10 years.
As Moscow Komsomolets said on August 19 in comments related to the possibility of Kuchma's pre-term resignation, "On the whole, all this goes the same way it did with us in Russia."
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