 Georgia - national flag
The Georgian national flag is the so-called five-cross flag, which was
introduced in January 2004 after the Rose Revolution. The flag is white with a
large red cross, in whose four squares are four small, straight-armed
crosses. It is known from the 1300's; the great cross is a Georgian cross,
with St. George being the patron saint of Georgia.
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Georgia (History)
Georgia has only rarely emerged as a single political entity; historically,
the country is characterized by a pronounced regionalization. The Likhi chain,
which connects the Great and Little Caucasus, thus forms a clear divide between
the western parts of the country, ie. Imereti, Mingrelien,
Meskhetien, Svanetien and Gurien, and the eastern ones, Kartli (Kartvelien) and
Kakhetien, and this has meant that West Georgia has been the subject of cultural
influence from the Mediterranean via the Black Sea, while East Georgia has
received decisive influence from the Iranian plateau via Kurad. Finally, the
geopolitical location of the Caucasus region has meant that Georgia has
generally been dominated by larger empires rooted in Anatolia or Persia.
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The first traces of people in Georgia date back to the Early Stone Age. Finds
from the Neolithic testify to settled tribes engaged in cattle ranching and
agriculture. From 3000-tkKr. there are signs of metal processing in bronze and
from the 1500's. in iron. Assyrian sources refer to a number of Uruguayan tribes,
such as in the early 1000's BC. settled in Anatolia and on the eastern Black Sea
coast. This area is known from Greek mythology as Kolkhis, which came under
Greek domination quite early. I 600-tfKr. forced other tribes, in Greek called
Iber, from Anatolia through the Upper Kuradal Valley and established a monarchy
in the province of Kartli, which the Greeks called Iberia. In 65 BC. Iberia came
under the rule of Rome, but Roman law did not prevail.
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In the beginning of 300-teKr. the king of Kartli adopted Christianity as a
counterweight to the Persian influence, and in the following centuries the
Georgian lands constituted a permanent zone of conflict between the Byzantine
Empire and Persia. Under this, the Black Sea region became more closely linked
to the Byzantine Empire, while Kartli came under Persian domination. In turn,
the Kartli dialect became the basis for the ecclesiastical written
language. Only at the end of 400-t. Vakhtang Gorgasali succeeded in
re-establishing an independent monarchy, but already in the mid-500's. local
petty princes again ruled under either Persian or Greek supremacy until the
Arabs in 654 invaded from the Kura Valley and conquered all of East Georgia.
I 800-t. began the first real kingdom assembly of the Georgian lands, based
on the common church language and led by an Armenian princely family, the
Bagratids. In 1122, King David Agmasjenebeli (1089-1125) took Tbilisi from the
Arabs, and the name Sakartvelo became a common name for both West and East
Georgia. Medieval Georgia had its golden age under the Bagratrid queen Tamar
(1184-1213), but it was put to an end with the Mongol invasion
of Transcaucasia in 1220. In the 1300's. another catastrophe occurred with Timur
Lenksrepeated invasions. The last ruler of the united Georgia was Alexander I
(1412-43), and after him the country was again divided into several warring
principalities. The Turkish conquest of Constantinople in 1453 cut off the
Georgian lands from Europe, and in the following centuries they were the toss-up
between the Ottoman Empire and Persia under the Safavids.
Russia showed interest in Georgia from the 1500's, but was not strong enough
to assert itself. With the increasing internal weakening of Persia, the Bagrata
era Irakli II in 1762 succeeded in gaining power over a united
Kartli-Kakhetien. At the same time, Imereti in West Georgia finally got rid of
the Ottomans.
The constant threat from the south now forced Georgia to seek help from
Russia, which in 1783 undertook to secure the country in return for its
acceptance of Russian supremacy. By a new Persian attack in 1795, however, the
promise proved worthless, and Georgia had to choose to either submit to Russia
unconditionally or perish. In 1801, the Kartli-Kakheti was incorporated and
placed under Russian military governors. The principalities of West Georgia were
all annexed between 1810 and 1864.
Georgia's incorporation into Russia boosted trade and industry, albeit under
the domination of Armenians and Russians, as most Georgians were still
peasants. At the same time, the gathering under a political authority and access
to education created cultural flourishing and budding national
consciousness. Against the background of a tightened Russian rule from the late
1800's. this contributed to the formation of a strong social democratic national
movement in the major cities.
The revolution in Russia in 1905 also caused unrest in Georgia, and at the
end of World War I in 1918, the Georgian Mensheviks declared the country an
independent republic. This was recognized by both England, France and the
Russian Bolsheviks in 1920, but in January 1921 the Red Army invaded and Georgia
was incorporated into Soviet Russia.
In 1922, Georgia and Armenia and Azerbaijan joined the Transcaucasian
Socialist Soviet Federation, but in 1936 it was made a full-fledged Union
Republic. The Soviet era was marked by periods of strong repression in the face
of attempts to achieve greater political independence. It was weighed in part by
the official nationality policy, which culturally favored the titular nations of
the Union Republics, but in turn discriminated against non-Georgian minorities
such as Abkhazians and South Ossetians. In the 1970's and early 1980's, Georgia
had one of the highest living standards in the Soviet Union; one benefited from
Soviet tourism and widespread corruption. After Gorbachevlaunch of perestroika
and glasnost, the people wanted more opportunities to decide for themselves and
began to demonstrate for greater independence from Moscow. In a peaceful
demonstration in Tbilisi in April 1989, 19 protesters were killed by Soviet
soldiers and several hundred wounded, increasing the Georgians' resentment
against Moscow. Later in 1989, the autonomous region of South
Ossetia demanded greater independence, after which the Georgian leadership
abolished the autonomous status of the region in 1990, and South Ossetia
declared independence from Georgia. Then fierce fighting broke out between the
South Ossetians and the Georgians.
In 1992, the armed conflict with South Ossetia ended with a ceasefire. In the
autumn of 1992, parliamentary elections were held, and the returning
Eduard Shevardnadze was elected Speaker of Parliament with the status of head of
state. In October 1993, a bloody conflict in Abkhazia ended with approximately 250,000
Georgians had to flee the region, which declared independence in 1994 and signed
a ceasefire with the Georgian government. With the independence of the Soviet
Union in April 1991, the pressure on minorities increased, and at the same time,
Georgia's historic regionalization resurfaced. It emerged when the country's
first elected president, the mingler Zviad Gamsakhurdia, was overthrown in
January 1992.
Following the adoption of the new constitution in August 1995, which gave the
newly created presidency extensive powers, Eduard Shevardnadze was elected
president by an overwhelming majority, and the same was repeated in the
presidential election in 2000. In the parliamentary elections, his party, the
Georgian Civil Union, also succeeded. to conquer the majority of the votes
cast. However, there were suspicions of electoral fraud in the parliamentary
elections in 1999 and the presidential elections in 2000. Shevardnadze was the
subject of two assassination attempts, in respectively. 1995 and 1998, and units
of the armed forces mutinied in both 1998 and 2001. With its majority in
parliament, Shevardnadze passed several important laws and the economy improved,
but the economic crisis in Russia in 1998 hit Georgia hard and the government
became more and more corrupt. Attempts to put an end to the widespread
corruption of civil servants led to several government
reshuffles. Shevardnadze's policies met with growing opposition, and in the 2002
local elections, the opposition made great strides. In the November 2003
parliamentary elections, the winner, according to the official election results,
became the coalition that supported Shevardnadze. The opposition did not believe
this, and under the leadership of MikhailSaakashvili raised a bloodless, popular
protest called the Rose Revolution. Shevardnadze had to resign at the end of
November, and in January 2004, Saakashvili was elected president with 96.3% of
the vote. In a new election of the 150 MPs elected by proportional
representation on party lists, the newly created National Movement -
Democrats bloc gained a majority in parliament, and Saakashvili immediately
set out to reunite the country, fight corruption, integrate the country into
Euro-Atlantic structures and establish a friendly relationship with Russia. In
May 2004, Saakashvili became the longtime leader of the Autonomous Republic
of Adjarato resign after the latter did not want to recognize him as
president. Then Saakashvili tried to reunite South Ossetia with Georgia, but
without success, because Russia supports the region. Russia is also
asserting its influence in Abkhazia, and therefore the conflict with this region
is not resolved either. In 2005, Russia agreed to close down its two military
bases in Georgia before the end of 2007, but relations with Russia remain
tense. Relations with the EU and the US are good. Saakashvili wants to orient
Georgia towards the EU, which has included the country in its neighborhood
policy, and he is working to expand contacts with NATO. The close relationship
with the United States was evident from President George W. Bush's visit to the
country in May 2005, and the United States provides strong support for economic
development, just as U.S. special forces have been training Georgian forces in
the fight against terrorism since 2001.
In the fall of 2007, internal opposition to Saakashvili grew after his former
defense minister, Irakli Okruashvili, accused him of corruption and plotting to
assassinate a Georgian media oligarch who supported the opposition. Okruasjvili
was arrested, accused of abuse of office during his time as
Minister. Prosecutors staged large-scale protests in Tbilisi, with the
opposition accusing Saakashvili of being authoritarian and doing too little to
fight poverty and demand his resignation. On 7/11, a demonstration in Tbilisi
was disbanded by police using tear gas, sticks and water cannons. On the same
day, Saakashvili declared a state of emergency in the country until
16.11.2007. and shut down the media oligarch's independent television station
Imedi for five months. He then called presidential elections ahead of time on
January 5, 2008. Seven candidates participated in the election, which
Saakashvili won with 53.5% of the vote. The election campaign and the election
action were strongly criticized byOSCE election observers in order not to live
up to OSCE and Council of Europe standards, including because Saakashvili
completely dominated the picture. The same applied to the parliamentary
elections held before 21.5.2008. Here, Saakashvili's party, the United National
Movement, dominated the election campaign between the 12 running parties and
blocs, and it also got 120 out of the 150 seats in parliament. At the same time
as the presidential election, a referendum was held on Georgian membership of
NATO. 77% voted in favor. However, at the NATO summit in Bucharest in April
2008, Georgia did not receive the expected membership action plan, but only a
promise of membership once a year.
In the summer of 2008, relations with Russia became further strained around
the breakaway republics of Abkhazia and especially South Ossetia.. After several
episodes on the border with South Ossetia, Georgia launched an invasion of the
area on August 8, 2008, during which the South Ossetian capital Tskhinvali was
bombed. The Russian response was immediate and violent, and certainly fell
behind the Georgian leadership. Russian forces invaded South Ossetia in large
numbers, and several bombings of military bases and air bases took place in
Georgia. After a few days, Georgia withdrew and tried to bring about a
ceasefire. Russia, however, pushed and drove the Georgian forces all the way out
of South Ossetia. The affair contributed to weakening Georgia
decisively; Following Russia's recognition of South Ossetia and Abkhazia at the
end of August 2008, it no longer seems realistic that Abkhazia and South Ossetia
could be reintegrated into Georgia,
Georgia is officially no longer a member of the CIS on 18.8.2009, following
the decision of President Mikheil Saakashvili on 12.8. about leaving the
community in political protest.
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