Throughout history, Georgia has gone through much turmoil. It has suffered under endless invasions, it’s forced incorporation into the Russian Empire and Soviet Union, a civil war in 1991 with the secession of two breakaway regions, and the Russo-Georgian War of 2008. They all have had a negative, lasting impact on the development of the country. Still, Georgia is a sovereign, independent nation striving for brighter future.
The Treaty of Georgievsk
Photo Source: Wikipedia
On July 24, 1783, a bilateral treaty between Catherine the Great of the Russian Empire and Erekle II, the king of the Eastern Georgian kingdom of Kartl-Kakheti, was signed in the small Russian town of Georgievsk. According to The Treaty of Georgievsk, Georgia signed became a protectorate of Russia that guaranteed security from Turk and Persian invaders. Despite the treaty, 12 years later, Russia refused to help Georgia in the Battle of Krtsanisi against the Persians. As a result, many areas of the country were ransacked and Kartl-Kakheti was reintegrated into the Persian Empire.
Annexy
In 1801 Georgia, according to Russia’s Tsar Paul I’s unilateral decree on its annexation, became a Russian province. For the next 117 years, Georgia was forced into being a part of the Russian Empire.
It wasn’t until the end of the Russian Bolshevik Revolution in 1917, which led to the final collapse of the Russian Tzarsit Empire, that the territories formerly under Saint Petersburg’s rule (like Georgia) were able to assert their independence.
Brief Independence and long lasting Soviet Occupation
As Tzarsit Russia was crumbling, Georgia was one of the first countries to take steps towards full independence. From May of 1918 to February of 1921 the Democratic Republic of Georgia (DRG) existed independently until it was forcibly reunited by the Russian Red Army.
Noe Jordania, the then Georgian prime minister, was forced into exile in France. Over 30,000 Georgians were killed in the war and the territories of the defeated DRG were split between Turkey and Russia with the latter declaring Georgia as a Soviet Socialist Republic. The old Southwestern DRG regions are still part of Turkey to this day.
From 1922, Georgia became a Soviet Socialist Republic until the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991.
“Both sexes are equal in political, civil, economic, and kindred independence.”
“Everyone is free to select their religious confession, to change that confession, or not to be part of any confession.”
“Citizens are all equal before the law” – Extracts from the First Constitution of Georgia, 1921.
The Bloody years
In 1930’s, Stalin initiated severe repressions, known as pogroms, across all of the Soviet Union. In Soviet Georgia over 60,000 people were imprisoned. Of those people, 20,000 were executed and the rest were exiled. The majority of the victims were of Georgia’s intellectual elite and these repressions took the lives of dozens of novelists, poets, musicians, and artists. The barbarism stopped after its bloodiest year, 1937, but soon Georgia was thrown into its deadliest conflict – World War II.
Over 300,000 Georgians were killed in that conflict. It may have been less than 0.5% of total casualties suffered in WWII, but that number was the vast majority of the adult male population of Georgia in 1940.
April 9 – The Day of Mourning
Photo Source: IDFI
On April 9, 1989, Georgians took to the streets of Tbilisi demanding complete independence from the Soviet Union. The government’s answer to the demonstration was to send troops to crush the peaceful protests, killing at least 20 people and leaving hundreds injured. The harshness of its reaction gave start to massive protests of citizens across Georgia against their Soviet rulers.
Independance at a high price
Photo Source: Agenda.ge
On March 31, 1991, a referendum on the restoration of the country’s independence was overwhelmingly approved. Georgia’s Declaration of Independence was signed in a session of the Supreme Council on 9 April 1991 and formally adopted on May 26, 1991. Georgian politician and dissident, Zviad Gamsakhurdia was elected the first president of the newly independent Georgia. Before his presidency, Gamsakhurdia was a leader of the Georgian national movement, struggling for the independence of their country. After being elected as president, Gamsakhurdia perused very nationalist and patriotic politics. In that same period, two regions within Georgia, Abkhazia and Samachablo (South Ossetia), which had enjoyed substantial autonomy throughout the Soviet period, intensified their calls for self-determination and secession from Georgia.
Abkhaz society held deep-rooted fears that their language, culture, and national identity were under threat and declared secession from Georgia which resulted in a 13-month civil war. As a result over 10,000 people died on both sides and hundreds of thousands fled from Abkhazia.
Photo Source: JAM News
On May 4, 1991, the South Ossetian Parliament declared its intention to separate from Georgia and unite with North Ossetia located within the borders of the Russian Federation. South Ossetia’s demands for reunification with North Ossetia transformed into full-scale violence, later provoking armed clashes between it and Georgia. In the wake of tensions in the country, the National Guard, and a paramilitary organization – “Mkhedrioni” instigated a coup d’état against the legitimate government of Georgia. A two-week battle in the center of Tbilisi later escalated into a larger war and the overthrow of President Gamsakhurdia who soon fled to the mountains and there committed a suicide.
Despite Georgia’s efforts to hold itself together, Abkhazia and Samachablo were both economically and militarily backed by Russia and have achieved a de facto independence that has not been recognized by Georgia nor by the majority of the world’s countries.
Foreign Policy
Photo Source: Los Angeles Times
By the end of the civil war in 1995, Eduard Shevardnadze, a former Soviet foreign minister, was brought to Georgia to manage the tense political situation. Shevardnadze gradually limited Mkhedrioni’s power and in November 1995 was elected president of Georgia. Under Shevardnadze’s presidency, Georgia changed its foreign policy focus towards the west and declared an ambition to join both North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and the European Union. The country became a major recipient of U.S. foreign and military aid and signed a strategic partnership with NATO.
“I am Georgian and therefore, I am European” – Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania at the Council of Europe, January 27, 1999.
Photo Source: Trend News Agency
Nevertheless, the country suffered from heavy crime and rampant corruption. The majority of the authorities, politicians, and law enforcers became highly corrupted which brought the country into great economic collapse.
Rose Revolution
Photo Source: Agenda.ge
On 2 November 2003, Georgia held a parliamentary election that was widely denounced as unfair and resulted in mass demonstrations throughout the country. These demonstrations became known as the “Rose Revolution” led by an opposition party leader, Mikheil Saakashvili, who broke into the parliament with his companions and forced President Shevardnadze to vacate the building. Shevardnadze later resigned and Mikheil Saakashvili was elected as a president of Georgia.
Following the Rose Revolution, a series of reforms were launched to strengthen the country’s military and economic capabilities, corruption was eliminated, crime rates diminished, and Georgia became one of the most vivid examples of an advancing democracy and became a vanguard of western values for the Caucasuses. Georgia’s cultivated further ties with and it’s pursued integration into NATO was in total contradiction to Russia’s geopolitical interests regarding the country.
The Five Days Of War
Photo Source: Euronews
As a result of Georgia’s western oriented foreign policy a tensed relationship with Russia was kindled. In 2008, those tensions culminated in a five day war, in August, between the two countries. Over 200 Georgians died and thousands were forced to move from Samachablo to other regions of Georgia. The aftermath of war and the rehabilitation process made life hard for Georgia but the country still did not digress from its Euro-Atlantic orientation.
The Georgian Dream
Photo Source: Atlantic Council
On October 2012, Saakashvili was defeated in Georgia’s parliamentary election by Bidzina Ivanishvili, a leader of an opposition party known as The Georgian Dream. Their winning is widely considered as the result of the outrage and demonstrations calling for Saakashvili’s resignation over leaked prison videos which revealed brutal and inhuman violence against its detainees. Shortly after the election, Saakashvili left Georgia and Ivanishvili became Prime Minister. After the 2013 presidential election, Ivanishvili voluntarily resigned, naming his long-time associate Irakli Gharibashvili as his successor. The later resigned in December, 2015 with the current Prime Minister, Giorgi Kvirikashvili, taking his place.
In November 2013, Giorgi Margvelashvili, a former Minister of Education and Science of Georgia and the First Deputy Prime Minister, was named by the Georgian Dream Coalition as its presidential candidate. After winning the presidential election with 62% of votes, Margvelashvili took office as Georgia’s current president.
