Widow of Georgia's 1st president protests Shevardnadze

The widow of the first president of Georgia, Manana Archvadze-Gamsakhurdia, and representatives of non-government organizations in Georgia protested at the Krtsanisi government residence were former president Eduard Shervardnadze now lives. Ms. Gamsakhurdia is protesting against the possible continuation of Mr. Shevardnadze's political career in the United Nations.

"Shevardnadze is guilty of a number of grave crimes," she said at the protests. "I demand that the Prosecutor General of Georgia open a criminal case for Shevardnadze and investigate the events of 1991-92, which he was directly involved in."

Last week, Kul Chandra Gautam, the deputy director of UNICEF and an assistant to UN Secretary General Kofi Annan, while on an official visit to Tbilisi, gave Mr. Shevardnadze a letter from Mr. Annan offering him the post of adviser to the UN secretary general.

Zviad Gamsakhurdia, the president of Georgia in the early 1990s, was exiled from Georgia in January 1992 as a result of an armed revolution and lived the last year of his life in Chechnya.

At the end of 1992, Mr. Gamsakhurdia secretly returned to Georgia and under unclear circumstances died in Dzhikhashkari, a village in western Georgia, in December 1992.