Georgia Is on Our Minds, But Abuses Are Ignored
Only Human
By Kathleen Peratis
Thu. Sep 04, 2008
Georgia has been America’s darling in the Caucasus since its
charismatic and telegenic young president, Mikheil Saakashvili, took
over from the nasty old Russian-style despot Eduard Shevardnadze in
the fall of 2003, in what came to be called the Rose Revolution
(because Saakashvili carried a rose, and not an AK-47, as he and the
throngs breached the doors of the country’s parliament building). All
the world (well, most of it) had high hopes for Saakashvili’s
reformist, democratic, anticorruption platform.
Throughout last month’s hostilities with Russia and in the weeks
since, little Georgia’s stock has only risen with the Bush
administration, as well as with the mainstream press and both
presidential candidates. "We are all Georgians," John McCain said. No
one in the Obama campaign demurred.
Despite – or even because of – this coalescing consensus, now may be a
good time to knock a few chunks out of Saakashvili’s pedestal. While
Saakashvili rightly gets credit for putting the fight against
corruption at the top of his agenda (in 2004, Transparency
International declared Georgia one of the most corrupt governments in
the world) and for combating religious and ethnic discrimination, he
and his government have also committed serious human rights abuses.
For one thing, Georgia tortures people. Every year since 2004, Amnesty
International and Human Rights Watch have reported on Abu Ghraib-like
treatment of prisoners in Georgian jails and prisons: Suspects have
been suspended between poles and beaten with truncheons or burned with
candles until they hemorrhaged from various parts of their bodies;
there have been threats to beat their mothers and children if they do
not confess to charges against them, according to Amnesty. In 2005 and
2006, Human Rights Watch detailed "several cases of torture" and
reported that in 2006 alone, at least seven detainees died in Tblisi
Prison No. 5. The group noted that Georgia’s government has neither
adequately investigated nor held anyone accountable for these and
other deaths in detention. Indeed, Georgia’s response in 2006 to
prisoner abuse claims constituted an additional abuse: It "used the
plea bargaining system to cover up allegations of torture," warning
prisoners, "If you tell anyone then it will get worse for you," and
"promising lower penalties to defendants who agreed to the official’s
version of events," according to Human Rights Watch.
The most well-documented abuses, however, are those against dissent
and free expression. In the few weeks between the resignation of
Shevardnadze and Saakashvili’s taking office, Saakashvili exploited
the euphoria of the revolution’s success by ramming through parliament
changes to the constitution that vastly increased the power of the
presidency, decreased its accountability and weakened the multiparty
system, according to Amnesty International’s 2005 country report on
Georgia.
Shortly after Saakashvili took office, the vibrant press that he had
inherited from the Shevardnadze era began to erode. Amnesty
International reported that it "has become increasingly concerned
about… allegations of government interference with freedom of the
media." Some of Georgia’s leading intellectuals – people who had
enthusiastically supported the Rose Revolution and who had opposed
Shevardnadze – wrote an open letter in October 2004, expressing their
concerns about the disappearance of an open press and the threat of
one-party dominance.
Doubts about Saakashvili’s true colors spread. In December 2006, the
Georgian parliament, at Saakashvili’s behest, amended the constitution
to delay presidential and parliamentary elections from early 2008 to
the end of 2009, which, according to the opposition parties, gave an
advantage to the ruling party. The move (later reversed) infuriated
the opposition and became its rallying cry.
In 2007, Saakashvili arrested critic (and former defense minister)
Irakli Okruashvili, who had accused Saakashvili of corruption and
suppression of dissent, which further spurred the opposition. In
November, there began a series of peaceful opposition demonstrations,
the largest of which attracted about 50,000 people. The police turned
one demonstration into a violent confrontation: They used a water
cannon against the front rows of demonstrators and simultaneously
launched a volley of tear gas and rubber bullets into the crowd.
Masked riot police pursued fleeing demonstrators, kicking and punching
them, and striking them with truncheons, wooden poles and other
objects, according to eyewitnesses. At least 500 people were injured,
some of them critically.
Later that evening, hundreds of heavily armed special forces entered
the private television station Imedi – which was fiercely critical of
Saakashvili – pointed guns to the heads of journalists and forced
Imedi off the air (for what turned out to be more than six weeks),
ejecting the staff and destroying much of the station’s equipment. A
state of emergency was declared that lasted for eight days.
According to Saakashvili and the Georgian government, the
demonstrators and the Imedi television station were dupes of the
Russians, who were allegedly seeking to sow public disorder and spark
a coup d’état. Critics, however, say the government never provided any
proof for this claim (although the claim seems more plausible now than
it did last year) and that the government’s conduct was in any case a
wildly disproportionate response to a peaceful demonstration.
Georgia’s promise to appoint a parliamentary commission to investigate
the riot has never materialized and, in light of the escalating
conflict with Russia, it seems to be off everyone’s agenda.
In response to these events, Saakashvili called a snap election for
January 2008, which the opposition alleges he stole through voter
intimidation and media dominance. International observers, however,
said the election was fair. Since then, as hostilities with Russia
have escalated, there have been few English-language reports of any
internal opposition to Saakashvili.
Georgia, of course, has a strong claim on our sympathies. In light of
recent events, the United States is legitimately concerned about
preserving Georgian sovereignty. That’s why it may be tempting to cut
Saakashvili a lot of slack on his government’s human rights record.
But this would not be doing Georgia any favors. Americans know that
cutting slack for human rights abuses does not make a country
stronger. Seven and a half years of Bush administration abuses should
have taught us at least that much.
Kathleen Peratis is a partner at the New York law firm Outten & Golden.