Saakashvili: A Bit More and this Regime Would have Fallen

"On June 20 we missed the moment, a bit more and this regime would have fallen," the former President of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili said in an interview with the program “Main Accents”.

"I think on June 20, the appropriate moment has been missed. It was not a conspiracy. Bidzina Ivanishvili was simply rebelling against himself. By his impudence, he provoked the people. Now we realized that there is no way back; it means the destruction of Georgia. Today the opposition is ready for everything. I am personally ready to sacrifice myself to the last drop of my blood. This year we will see Ivanishvili off. The Georgian people will follow us when they see that the leaders sacrifice themselves. We have leaders. Nika Melia showed examples of amazing courage, the same did Jorika Rurua”, – he said.

Saakashvili's statement refers to the notorious developments of June 20 in Georgia's capital Tbilisi, when protests started on Rustaveli Avenue in reaction to the visit of three Russian MPs to Georgia within the framework of a session of the Inter-parliamentary Assembly on Orthodoxy held at the Parliament building, mostly due to the fact that Russian MP Sergei Gavrilov sat in the parliamentary Speaker’s chair, speaking in Russian, which many Georgians saw as the unwelcome reminder of the Russian occupation of the country's breakaway regions of Abkhazia and Tskhinvali (South Ossetia). 

The protest turned into clashes with police after protesters tried to enter the parliament building. 

The so-called Gavrilov Night protest was dispersed by riot police with the use of tear gas, rubber bullets and water cannon. 240 individuals, including 32 journalists and 80 law enforcers, were injured during a clash on Rustaveli Avenue on June 20-21. 

By Ana Dumbadze