The Georgian Times
2007.11.12 12:22

Personal Internet Commentary on Current Events

You can say what you like on the internet. Some interesting
unsolicited material has been circulating as a result of the current
situation in Georgia. The political crisis has prompted people to send
e-mails to THE GEORGIAN TIMES , and posts to various internet sites,
adding their twopennyworth on the unfolding events.

Various Georgians around the world have received an invitation to sign
an online petition entitled ?Stop abuses by the government of
Georgia.? This was begun by US based Georgian human rights activist
Anna Dolidze and is targeted at the Government of the United States,
the United Nations Organization, the Council of Europe and the
European Union. The petition describes the actions of the government
in regard to the demonstrations and calls for the international
community to intervene in the crisis, condemn ?massive violation of
human rights?, stop the ?persecution of opposition members?, pressure
the government to cancel emergency rule, compel the government to
?release political prisoners? and satisfy the appeal for peaceful
dialogue. The petition is hosted by the independent international
petition hosting forum As of 18:00 on Saturday 10
November it had attracted nearly 4,000 signatures, some of them well
known names in Georgia such as Shalva Natelashvili, Jondi Baghaturia,
Irakli kakabadze.

Another item doing the rounds through Skype is an online poll. This is
a rather odd item because there is no indication to the outside
observer of what it is about. It is hosted by free poll website
and simply says in a red box, ?2008
Parlamentarian (sic) Elections (Spring-Fall)?, giving users the option
of clicking on the spring or fall box. There is no reference to
Georgia. By 18:00 on Saturday only 27 people had voted, of which 18
favoured spring and 9 fall (autumn). The poll has been overtaken by
the decision to hold the Presidential election in January but it does
warn users at the bottom, ?Poll results are subject to error and are
for entertainment only.?

Photographs are also being sent around. One received by GEORGIAN
TIMES, without any accompanying text, showed Avtandil Jorbenadze,
former Minister of State under Shevardnadze being beaten with a stick
by a man wearing black civilian clothes, but having a balaclava on his
head masking his face. The Flickr site () also has a
number of photos of the police action against the demonstrators. The
international YouTube video site has several entries on the current
crisis. One shows the police using tear gas and another the
demonstrations in Zugdidi, subtitled in English. Ironically the source
of many of these is ?Russia Today.?

Bloggers have of course been busy. The ?Resistance Georgia? blog
() has reported that Levan
Mikeladze, Georgia?s ambassador to the Swiss Confederation and Head of
the Mission of Georgia to International Organizations in Geneva, has
resigned from his post as he can no longer support a government which
uses force on the opposition. Joshua Keating, an editor of the journal
?Foreign Policy?, writes a blog at
Thursday?s entry is entitled ?The sad end of the Rose Revolution? and
includes quotes by people who were beaten by police. This identifies
the people wearing black clothes and balaclavas as police. Another
blogsite called ?BoingBoing? () has a different take
on the conflict. A posting on November 8 displays a photograph of a
riot policeman in a mask. The accompanying text is: ?The Rose
Revolution in the former Soviet state of Georgia is collapsing under
phalances (sic) of riot-cops. This is distressing, but also
fascinating — who knew that the Georgian riot cop standard issue
included a freaky white Mickey Mouse mask?? The mask does indeed
resemble the face of Mickey Mouse, the well known icon of American and
pro-American culture.

TOL Georgia () carries an article by ?jibs?
headlined ?Georgia: Democracy in Crisis.? This is one of a number of
articles under the heading ?Saakashvili? that have been building up
during the week. One of these directly quotes the GEORGIAN TIMES.
Another blogging website is Global Voices
(). This is a ?non-profit global citizens?
media project founded at Harvard Law School?s Berkman Center for
Internet and Society, a research think-tank focused on the Internet?s
impact on society.? A post from Wednesday by Onnik Krikorian is
entitled: ?Georgia ? End of a Fairy Tale?? This is a summary of blogs
>From various sources. One of the most interesting is from an Armenian
blogger on Unzipped: ?Just listened to President Saakashvili?s speech
on the latest developments in Georgia, involving the forceful
dispersal of the opposition demonstration. He put the blame on Russia
again. I think Russians need to pack on and leave somewhere towards
South America, so that they are not blamed for Georgia?s internal
affairs. How can all this be blamed on Russia? Are those 70,000 people
that showed up in the first day of the protests ALL Russian puppets?
Long live our saviour and protector against the Russian dark magic!?
The Global Voices blog however also directs readers to pro-Saakashvili
comments on other blogs, such as ?There are huge possibilities for
good in this country and I hope that the President, Saakashvili, is
smart enough to be able to quell this thing without having to resort
to Soviet era tactics of repression. I will be an unequivocal
supporter of him if he can figure out a way to address the core of
what the protestors are saying.?

Internet contributions are not usually moderated and therefore have
much more scope to be opinionated. But perhaps the most remarkable of
the internet comments come from a source designed to be entirely
neutral. The online encyclopedia Wikipedia already has an entry on the
?2007 Georgian Demonstrations?. It does warn readers that this is a
current event and that the content of the article may change as it
unfolds. But it gives a full account of events so far and now purports
to be a finished article. It includes a timeline of the events leading
up to the demonstrations and some international reaction. Encyclopedia
articles about historic events are usually not written or published
until well after the event, when hindsight has lent a different layer
of meaning to what happened. An encyclopedia article written about
something while it is taking place will be a valuable addition to the
yet-to-be-written history of this period.

Internet activity gives people who have no other outlet the chance to
express their views to the world. Every view under the sun is
therefore likely to appear. The tone of the internet activity visible
so far is resolutely opposed to the government?s actions against
demonstrators, and its arguments are based primarily on this
occurrence rather the wider range of concerns expressed by government
and opposition and in print media.

Rumwold Leigh for The Georgian Times
2007.11.12 12:22

;newsid=7747