In this role, he has met with a number of foreign leaders, including the Presidents of Russia Vladimir Putin and of Georgia Eduard Shevardnadze.

It has widely been speculated that Shevardnadze had a hand in his boss's downfall ; he was certainly the obvious candidate to replace Mzhavanadze.

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.

Since early 2000s, Kitovani has lived in Moscow from where he harshly criticized the Shevardnadze government on several occasions.

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

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.

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

It was during his Komsomol First Secretaryship that Shevardnadze would meet Mikhail Gorbachev for his first time.

Shevardnadze challenged Tbilisi First Secretary Otari Lolashvili, and later charged him for corrupion.

Shevardnadze rallied up support for his corruption campaigns by establishing the Study of Public Opinion.

At the 25th Congress of the Georgian Communist Party Shevardnadze told the congress ; " for Georgians, the sun rises not in the east, but in the north — in Russia ".

At the 25th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union ( CPSU ) in 1976 Shevardnadze held a speech in which he called General Secretary Leonid Brezhnev " vozhd " ( leader ), a term previously reserved for Joseph Stalin.

During Brezhnev's last days Shevardnadze had publicly endorsed Konstantin Chernenko's candidacy for the General Secretaryship and called him a " great theoretician ".

However, when it became clear that the secretaryship would not go to Chernenko, but instead Yuri Andropov, Shevardnadze swiftly reiterated his position and gave his support for Andropov.

Shevardnadze's became the first Soviet republican head to offer his gratitude to the newly elected leader, in turn, Andropov quickly signaled his appreciation and his support for some of the reforms launched by Shevardnadze.

When Andropov died Shevardnadze became yet again an avid supporter for Chernenko's candidacy for the General Secretaryship.

Russian foreign minister Igor Ivanov flew to Tbilisi to visit three main opposition leaders and Shevardnadze, and arranged on late 23 November for Saakashvili and Zurab Zhvania to meet Shevardnadze.

The German government offered Shevardnadze political asylum in Germany, where he is still widely respected for his role as one of the chief Soviet architects of reunification in 1990.

On 12 October 2000, Saakashvili became Minister of Justice for the government of President Shevardnadze.

In 1995, Burjanadze was elected to the Parliament of Georgia for the Union of Citizens of Georgia ( UCG ) then chaired by the President of Georgia Eduard Shevardnadze and supported financially by her father Anzor Burjanadze, a wealthy businessman .. She first chaired the Parliamentary Committee for Constitutional Law from 1998 to 1999, and the Parliamentary Committee for International Relations from 2000 to 2001.

One of Burjanadze's first actions was to appeal for national unity and repeal the state of emergency declared by Shevardnadze, in an effort to restore stability to a with a long history of political violence.

Shevardnadze established the Union of Citizens of Georgia to provide a moderate centre-right grouping for reformist democrats.

In response, Zhvania and other opposition figures called for mass protests against Shevardnadze.

In the post-coup absence of legitimate power, a position of the Head of State was introduced for Georgia's new leader Eduard Shevardnadze on March 10, 1992.

Ioseliani was detained in November 1998 and held for three years pending trial, then sentenced to 11 years for banditry, terrorism, and conspiring to kill Shevardnadze.

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

These agencies worked closely with Georgia's communications networks, such as television, and government ministers and Shevardnadze himself were regularly interviewed live on television.

The war in the Russian republic of Chechnya on Georgia's northern border caused considerable friction with Russia, which accused Shevardnadze of harbouring Chechen guerrillas and supported Georgian separatists in apparent retaliation.

Saakashvili's " storming of Georgia's parliament " in 2003 " put U. S. diplomats off guard ... ousted a leader the U. S. had long backed, Eduard Shevardnadze.

In March 2006 interview with the Washington Post Georgia's ex-president Eduard Shevardnadze also said that he believed Zhvania was murdered.

* Eduard Shevardnadze, Georgia's former president.

Georgia's ex-president Eduard Shevardnadze visited the region several times during his rule in 1992-2003 to attempt reconciliation with Abashidze.

She called on President Eduard Shevardnadze to use tough measures against the mass demonstrations that led to Georgia's Rose Revolution in November 2003.

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.

Seven months before his promotion to the Soviet Foreign Affairs Ministership Shevardnadze claimed that there were thirty, or more, economic experiments operating in Georgia which he claimed would further democratise the economic management.

Shevardnadze saw " extreme nationalism ", coupled with corruption and inefficiencies within the system, as one of the main obstacles to economic growth.

Gorbachev fought to preserve a socialist government and the unity of the Soviet Union, while Shevardnadze advocated further political and economic liberalisation.

After Shevardnadze was ousted in the Rose Revolution of 21 – 23 November 2003, Noghaideli returned to government as the economic adviser to the acting president, Nino Burjanadze.

Shevardnadze was appointed to the First Secretaryship of the Georgian Communist Party by the Soviet government with the task of suppressing the grey and black-market capitalism that had grown under Vasil Mzhavanadze's rule.

Shevardnadze published his memoirs in May 2006 under the title pikri tsarsulsa da momavalze, or ' Thoughts about the Past and the Future '.

A likely armed conflict was prevented by President Eduard Shevardnadze, going to Kodori to bring the situation under control.

In May 1992, Shevardnadze appointed Kitovani Minister of Defence in an effort to bring the National Guard under central control.

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.