home
***
CD-ROM
|
disk
|
FTP
|
other
***
search
/
Time - Man of the Year
/
Time_Man_of_the_Year_Compact_Publishing_3YX-Disc-1_Compact_Publishing_1993.iso
/
moy
/
032392
/
0323007.000
< prev
next >
Wrap
Text File
|
1992-08-28
|
1KB
|
31 lines
WORLD, Page 43World NotesGEORGIA Comeback Politics
In Russia he is known as the incorruptible paladin of
democracy who resigned because he could not countenance
dictatorship. To the rest of the world he was the public face of
perestroika who played a pivotal role in ending the cold war. So
it is a bit strange to see Eduard Shevardnadze staging a comeback
in the one place where his reputation has been dogged by obloquy:
his native Georgia.
During the republic's campaign for independence, the
erstwhile friend of Mikhail Gorbachev was branded a "top Kremlin
agent." But in the wake of ousting dissident turned despot Zviad
Gamsakhurdia in January, Tbilisi leaders took a more benign view
of the onetime Georgian Communist Party boss and last week
appointed him to chair the new State Council, effectively giving
Shevardnadze stewardship of his mountainous homeland. The
veteran diplomat now faces pressing tasks: staving off economic
collapse, healing the divisions created by months of civil
strife and ending the isolation into which Georgia was pushed
during Gamsakhurdia's flirtation with dictatorship.