Bush in Georgia and the next revolution?
Civil.ge reports that US President George Bush will address Georgian citizens from Tbilisi’s Freedom Square on 10 May.
Georgian authorities installed number of banners and billboards in capital city, as well as in some other towns, welcoming the U.S. President. The banners also call on the Georgian citizens to attend George W. Bush’s address at Freedom Square.
http://www.civil.ge/eng/article.php?id=9748
Incidentally, Katy recently blogged that Saakashvili would announce the venue for the next revolution but I’m not sure if he ever did. However, Civil.ge also reports that Bush might meet with the leader of the Belarus opposition.
In an interview with the Rustavi 2 television Vice-Speaker of the Georgian Parliament Mikheil Machavariani confirmed that he personally invited Anatoly Lebedko to visit Tbilisi on May 10 in an attempt to meet with George W. Bush.
http://www.civil.ge/eng/article.php?id=9749
Lukashenko is described as the “last dictator in Europe” and Condoleezza Rice recently clashed with the Russian Foreign Minister when she called for change in the country. There’s a student from Belarus in Armenia at the moment and while economic conditions sound a lot better than here, in terms of democracy, media freedom and human rights it sounds absolutely terrible.
Presidential Elections in Belarus are scheduled for next year. An allegedly suspect referendum has already apparently removed the constitutional two-term restriction for the incumbent who would have otherwise had to stand down.
Anyway, my bet is that Saakashvili was referring to Belarus so it’s interesting to see that the Georgians are trying to arrange this meeting.
He did announce it
http://www.cominganarchy.com/archives/2005/04/24/the-black-spot/
Comment by Chirol — 4/30/2005 @ 1:49 pm
“Saakashvili also said that GUUAM leaders are ready to help Belarus towards democracy.”
Ok, got it. Helping countries towards democracy is a way of saying fermenting revolution if the elections are falsified. Anyway, while Belarus sounds horrendous in terms of human rights and all the rest of that stuff, I find it a bit bewildering to hear that Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan could (or should) help anyone towards democracy as part of GUUAM.
Comment by Onnik — 4/30/2005 @ 3:40 pm
It should be noted that Uzbekistan wasn’t there, hasn’t participated for a while, and will probably formally leave the organization. Azerbaijan meanwhile… It is a bit odd and they must find the potential economic and security benefits of membership appealing enough to swallow the democracy promotion (so long as it isn’t aimed at Aliyev I would suppose).
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