Despite criticism from the opposition, Eduard Shevardnadze, President of Georgia, refused to deploy troops against Abkhazia.

In April 2001, with a simmering conflict in the UCG, Merabishvili, then a chairman of the Parliamentary Committee for Economic Policy, became the first and, at that time, the only leading member of the party to openly criticise Shevardnadze.

Many accuse Eduard Shevardnadze ’ s government of the initiation of senseless hostilities, and then of ineffective conduct of the war and post-war diplomacy.

Shevardnadze failed to have Kitovani ’ s force withdrawn from Abkhazia and the country became involved in a thirteen-month-long war which would end in Georgia ’ s loss of control over most of Abkhazia.

Shevardnadze ’ s successor as President of Georgia, Mikheil Saakashvili, has also accused Kitovani of being a " Russian agent " and blamed him for the loss of Abkhazia.

During the war in Abkhazia, Kitovani developed a power centre rivalling Shevardnadze ’ s and on several occasions challenged Shevardnadze, now Head of State, on defence matters, suggesting that he should be responsible only for foreign policy.

In February 2002, he responded scandalously to the mysterious suicide of Nugzar Sajaia, Shevardnadze ’ s close ally and an influential Chairman of Georgia ’ s National Security Council, making allegations that Sajaia was a homosexual and had ordered the 2001 murder of journalist Giorgi Sanaia.

He was energetically involved in the protest movement following the November 2003 parliamentary elections which led to Shevardnadze ’ s resignation in the bloodless Rose Revolution.

He was sacked, in 2002, without explanation, though it appears that he had intended to resign in protest against the policies of Shevardnadze ’ s increasingly corrupted government ( as the Minister of Justice Mikheil Saakashvili did a year before ).

The process of legal " rehabilitation " ( exoneration ) of the victims of the 1920s repressions began under Mikhail Gorbachev ’ s policy of Glasnost (" openness ") and was completed in 25 May 1992 decree issued by the State Council of the Republic of Georgia chaired by Eduard Shevardnadze.

After the fall of Gamsakhurdia, Chanturia was in moderate opposition to Eduard Shevardnadze ’ s government in 1992-1994.

After Gamsakhurdia ’ s fall, he became Prime Minister in the Georgian interim government ( Military Council, later transformed into the State Council ) which was joined by Eduard Shevardnadze ) on 6 January 1992.

Shevardnadze has been accused of rejecting the offer by the hijackers ’ parents to negotiate with their sons the release of the hostages.

The Adjara crisis refers to a political crisis in Georgia ’ s Adjaran Autonomous Republic, then led by Aslan Abashidze, who refused to obey the central authorities after President Eduard Shevardnadze ’ s ousting during the Rose Revolution of November 2003.

Adjaran leader Aslan Abashidze, being in strong opposition to the Rose Revolution, declared the state of emergency immediately after Eduard Shevardnadze ’ s ousting on November 23, 2003.

Later, he distanced himself from Abashidze, remaining, however, in opposition to Eduard Shevardnadze ’ s government.

The idea to establish the NRP began to emerge during the time when Eduard Shevardnadze was still President and his Citizens ’ Union of Georgia ( CUG ) was an influential force on the political stage of the country.

This triggered fierce public discontent nation-wide, which eventually resulted in the toppling of Shevardnadze ’ s regime in the Rose Revolution.

The latter's party, the Union of Democratic Revival of Georgia, cooperated with Shevardnadze's ruling Union of Citizens of Georgia party in the 1995 parliamentary elections, but broke with Shevardnadze after the elections.

Saakashvili and other Georgian opposition leaders formed a " United People's Alliance " in November 2003 to bring together the United National Movement, the United Democrats, the Union of National Solidarity and the youth movement " Kmara " in a loose alliance against the government of President Eduard Shevardnadze.

Otpor members were instrumental in inspiring and providing hands-on training to several other civic youth organizations in Eastern Europe and elsewhere, including Kmara in the Republic of Georgia ( itself partly responsible for the downfall of Eduard Shevardnadze ), Pora in Ukraine ( which was part of the Orange Revolution ), Zubr in Belarus ( opposing the president Alexander Lukashenko ), MJAFT!

") was a civic youth resistance movement in Georgia, active in the protests prior to and during the November 2003 Rose Revolution, which toppled down the government of Eduard Shevardnadze.

Eduard Shevardnadze, then a Komsomol leader in Kutaisi and eventually to become President of post-Soviet Georgia, later recalled that Khrushchev's ironical remark on Georgians at the end of his speech was particularly hurtful to the pride of Georgian youth.

Following a crisis involving allegations of ballot fraud in the 2003 parliamentary elections, Eduard Shevardnadze resigned as president on November 23, 2003, in the bloodless Rose Revolution.

The Great Purge was extremely severe and included not only Georgian communists but also intellectuals, even those without any political views, among them Mikheil Javakhishvili, Titsian Tabidze, Sandro Akhmeteli, Yevgeni Mikeladze, Dimitri Shevardnadze, George Eliava, Grigol Tsereteli and many others.

The Soviet leadership wanted to ease Karmal out of politics, but when Najibullah began to complain that he was hampering his plans of National Reconciliation, the Soviet Politburo decided to remove Karmal ; this motion was supported by Andrei Gromyko, Yuli Vorontsov, Eduard Shevardnadze, Anatoly Dobrynin and Viktor Chebrikov.

* 2003 – Rose Revolution: the Georgian president Eduard Shevardnadze resigns following weeks of mass protests over flawed elections.

* 1987 – United States Secretary of State George Shultz and Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze sign a treaty to establish centers to reduce the risk of nuclear war.

He appeared on the popular U. S. television program Good Morning America to discuss a speech made two days earlier by Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze.

* 29 August 1995 – Eduard Shevardnadze, the Georgian head of state, survives an assassination attempt in Tbilisi.

* 9 February 1998 – Eduard Shevardnadze, the Georgian head of state, survives an assassination attempt in Tbilisi.

* September 27 – War in Abkhazia – Fall of Sukhumi: Eduard Shevardnadze accuses Russia of passive complicity.

* August 29 – Eduard Shevardnadze, the Georgian head of state, survives an assassination attempt in Tbilisi.

During a Politburo meeting Eduard Shevardnadze said " We will leave the country in a deplorable situation ", and talked further about economic collapse, and the need to keep at least 10, 000 to 15, 000 troops in Afghanistan.

In September 2003, former Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze made a last minute decision not to sign this agreement with the Vatican after a protest rally took place in Tbilisi, provoked from and backed by the Georgian Orthodox Church.

During his time as president, Eduard Shevardnadze made statements criticizing anti-Semitic acts.

Ivanov played a key role in mediating a deal between Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze and opposition parties during Georgia's " Rose Revolution " in 2003.

However, as early as 1988, then-Soviet foreign minister Eduard Shevardnadze had discussed the possibility of a withdrawal from Cam Ranh Bay, and concrete naval reductions were realised by 1990.

In 1994, President Shevardnadze issued a decree to protect Jewish religious, cultural and historic monuments.

In Georgia, the government of Eduard Shevardnadze ( who was then First Secretary of the Georgian Communist Party ) arrested Gamsakhurdia and his fellow dissident Merab Kostava.

In an open letter to Shevardnadze, dated April 19, 1992, Gamsakhurdia claimed that " my so-called confession was necessitated ... if there had been no ' confession ' and my release from the prison in 1979 had not taken place, then there would not have been a rise of the national movement.

He handed a set of " Demands of the Georgian People " to Shevardnadze outside the Congress of the Georgian Writers Union at the end of March 1981, which earned him another spell in jail.

Eduard Ambrosis dze Shevardnadze ( ; born 25 January 1928 ) is a former Soviet minister of foreign affairs, and later, Georgian statesman from the height to the end of the Cold War.

Shevardnadze was responsible for many top decisions on Soviet foreign policy in the Gorbachev Era.

His anti-corruption work quickly garnered the interest of the Soviet government, and Shevardnadze was appointed to First Deputy of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Georgian SSR.

Shevardnadze anti-corruption campaign continued until he resigned from his office as First Secretary.