Timeline Georgia
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USSD: http://www.state.gov/www/background_notes/georgia_9811_bgn.html
The capital of Georgia is Tbilisi.
1.8Mil BC Hominid fossils and crude stone tools of this time were found in the former Soviet republic of Georgia in 1991 beneath the ruins of a medieval castle at Dmanisi. The tools were similar to ones in China dating at 1.66 million. A 3rd smaller skull was found in 2002. All 3 were tentatively classified as Homo erectus. One skull of a man indicated that he had been almost toothless for at least 2 years before death. In 2013 a study of the findings was published in Science.
(Arch, 9/02, p.10)(SFC, 5/12/00, p.A5)(SFC, 7/5/02, p.A5)(SFC, 4/7/05, p.A3)(SFC, 10/18/12, p.A4)
33000BC Ivory carving dating to about this time depicted a busty woman. It was found in 2008 in a German cave and was unveiled in 2009 by archaeologists who believed it to be the oldest known sculpture of the human form. The carving found in six fragments in Germany's Hohle Fels cave depicts a woman with a swollen belly, wide-set thighs and large, protruding breasts.
(AP, 5/14/09)
8000BC Wine was produced in the region known as Colchis (later Georgia) as early as this time.
(Econ, 11/15/08, p.100)
500-600 The monastic complex of David Gareja was founded in the 6th century by David (St. David Garejeli), one of the thirteen Assyrian monks who arrived in Georgia at the same time. His disciples Dodo and Luciane expanded the original lavra and founded two other monasteries known as Dodo's Rka (literally, "the horn of Dodo") and Natlismtsemeli ("the Baptist"). Part of the complex is also located in the Agstafa rayon of Azerbaijan and thus became subject to a border dispute between Georgian and Azerbaijani authorities.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Gareja_monastery_complex)
632-661 The Rashidun Caliphate, also known as the Rightly Guided Caliphate, comprising the first four caliphs in Islam's history, was founded after Muhammad's death. At its height, the Caliphate extended from the Arabian Peninsula, to the Levant, Caucasus and North Africa in the west, to the Iranian highlands and Central Asia in the east. It was the one of the largest empires in history up until that time.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rashidun_Caliphate)
683-685 Khazars invaded Transcaucasia and inflicted much damage and stole much booty. The Khazar invaders killed the rulers of Armenia and Georgia.
(TJOK, p.159)
1014 May 7, Bagrat III (b~960) of the Georgian Bagrationi dynasty, died. He was King of the Abkhazians from 978 on (as Bagrat II) and King of Kings of the Georgians from 1008 on. He is known to have constructed a magnificent cathedral, the Bagrati Cathedral, at Kutaisi, western Georgia. Its ruins named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1994.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagrat_III_of_Georgia)(http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/710)
1089-1125 David the Builder, a king who increased Georgia's wealth and prestige after, at age 16, taking the reins of a country beset by attackers.
(AP, 1/25/04)(Internet)
1172-1216 Shota Rustaveli, a Georgian poet, lived about this time. He is considered by many to be one of the greatest representatives of the literature of the medieval world. His literary work included “The Knight in the Panther's Skin" ("Vepkhistkaosani" in Georgian), the Georgian national epic poem.
(http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9064497)
1178 The wise King Giorgi III of Georgia had his daughter, Tamara (19), crowned as his co-ruler to provide an orderly succession.
(www.undelete.org/woa/woa01-18.html)
1204-1205 Georgia’s Queen Tamara marched with her men to the rousing victory over the Turks at the Battle of Basiani where she is hailed with the cry, "Our King Tamara."
(www.undelete.org/woa/woa01-18.html)
1212 Jan 18, Queen Tamara of Georgia in Transcaucasia died after a 24-year reign during which her soldiers proclaim her "our King."
(www.undelete.org/woa/woa01-18.html)
1236 Queen Rusudani (41), the daughter of Queen Tamara, fled Georgia as the unstoppable Mongol hordes ravished the area. She had been proclaimed "King" at the death of her brother.
(www.undelete.org/woa/woa01-18.html)
1258 Feb 10, Huegu (Hulega Khan), a Mongol leader and grandson of Genghis Khan, seized Baghdad following a 4-day assault. Mongol invaders from Central Asia took over Baghdad and ended the Abbasid-Seljuk Empire. They included Uzbeks, Kazaks, Georgians and other groups. Some 200 to 800 thousand people were killed and looting lasted 17 days.
(ATC, p.91)(AP, 2/10/99)(SFC, 4/12/03, p.A1)
1265 Mongols sacked the monastic complex of David Gareja in Georgia.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Gareja_monastery_complex) (Econ, 8/28/10, p.50)
1395 Tamerlane, a Turkic conqueror, swept into Southern Russia and Georgia driving locals into the hills.
(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A12)
1615 The Persians sacked the monastic complex of David Gareja in Georgia.
(Econ, 8/28/10, p.50)
1722 Peter the Great exploited the chaos in the Persian Empire to lead an expedition into Transcaucasia, he struck an alliance with Vakhtang VI, the Georgian ruler of Kartli.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_within_the_Russian_Empire)
1769-1772 A handful of Russian troops of General Totleben battled against Turkish invaders in Imereti and Kartl-Kakheti.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_within_the_Russian_Empire)
1783 Jul 24, Georgia became a protectorate of tsarist Russia.
(MC, 7/24/02)
1798 Jan 11, Erekle II (b.~1720), Georgian monarch of the Bagrationi Dynasty, died. He had reigned as the king of Kakheti from 1744 to 1762, and of Kartli and Kakheti from 1762 until 1798. His name is frequently transliterated from the Latinized form Heraclius.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_within_the_Russian_Empire)
1801 South Ossetia was absorbed into the Russian Empire along with Georgia.
(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A12)
1876 May, Residents in Tbilisi, Georgia, found a collection of ancient gold jewels in the muddy streets following a downpour. The objects were dated from the 5th to the 1st century BC when the region was known as Colchis.
(Econ, 11/15/08, p.100)
1890 The Marxist Armenian Revolutionary Federation, called the Dashnaks, was founded in the Russian Empire, in Tiflis (Georgia).
(http://homepages.cae.wisc.edu/~dwilson/Armenia/justin.html)
1905 Mar 8, The peasant revolt in Russia was reported to be spreading to Georgia.
(HN, 3/8/98)
1906 Apr 10, A report from Russia said 7 soldiers were killed during a rebellion at the garrison in Tiflis (Tbilisi, Georgia). On April 17 it was reported that 315 soldiers were killed in a fight between mutineers and loyal troops.
(SFC, 4/18/06, p.A15)
1907 Stalin (1879-1953) organized an armed robbery on 2 coaches carrying treasure to the state bank in central Tbilisi, Georgia. He delivered his gains to Lenin. In 2007 Simon Sebag Montefiore authored “Young Stalin."
(Econ, 5/19/07, p.88)
1918 South Ossetians made a bid to break away from Georgia and thousands fled in the ensuing violence. Menshevik Georgia waged a brutal war to absorb Abkhazia and South Ossetia. In 1921 the Red Army regained control and absorbed all three into the Soviet Union.
(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A12)(Econ, 10/23/10, p.102)
1921 Feb 12, Soviet troops invaded neighboring Georgia.
(MC, 2/12/02)
1922 South Ossetia became an autonomous region within the Soviet Republic of Georgia.
(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A12)
1928 Jan 25, Eduard Shevardnadze, foreign minister of USSR, was born in Soviet Georgia.
(MC, 1/25/02)
1931 USSR leader Joseph Stalin turned Abkhazia into an autonomous region of Georgia. Beria, his secret police chief, later resettled Georgians from the western part of the country in Abkhazia.
(Econ, 7/5/08, p.64)
1936 Dec 5, Armenian SSR, Azerbaijan SSR, Georgian SSR, Kazakh SSR & Kirghiz SSR became constituent republics of Soviet Union.
(MC, 12/5/01)
1986 The Georgian film “Repentance" was directed by Tengiz Abuladze. It was an allegory about a small town mayor who gradually becomes a despot. The film was about the crimes of Stalinism and was banned by censors.
(SFC, 9/23/98, p.A10)(Econ, 7/12/14, p.82)
1987 Sep 13, Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze arrived in Washington for talks aimed at a possible superpower summit; Shevardnadze carried with him a letter from Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev to President Reagan.
(AP, 9/13/97)
1988 Jan 6, Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze was quoted by the Afghan news agency as saying the Kremlin wanted to pull an estimated 115,000 soldiers from Afghanistan in the coming year.
(AP, 1/6/98)
1989 Apr, Troops of Russian General Igor Rodionov killed 29 demonstrators in Tbilisi. Troops under Russian Gen’l Lebed killed 18 protestors, including 16 women and children, in Tbilisi, Georgia. Colonel Gen’l. Igor Rodionov ordered the troops to break up anti-Kremlin protests in Tbilisi.
(WSJ, 6/18/96, p.A12)(SFC, 6/26/96, p.A11)(http: ICL)
1989-1982 South Ossetia defended itself from Georgia with aid from Russia and about 1,000 people died in the fighting. Some 25-40,000 people fled the area.
(SFC, 9/1/98, p.A10)
1990 Aug, South Ossetia, a region of north central Georgia with a population of about 100,000, declared itself sovereign. Ethnic Ossetians speak a language similar to Persian. Georgia abolished South Ossetia’s autonomous status following the attempted break. Georgian leader Zviad Gamsakhurdia declared South Ossetia part of Georgia and marched on Tskhinvali, the declared capital.
(SFC, 9/1/98, p.A10)(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A12)
1990 Dec 20, Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze shocked Soviet lawmakers by announcing his resignation, warning that "dictatorship is coming."
(AP, 12/20/00)
1991 Apr 9, Georgia SSR declared independence from the USSR.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_(country))
1991 Apr 29, More than 100 people were killed and some 100,000 were left homeless when a strong earthquake struck Soviet Georgia.
(AP, 4/29/01)
1991 Jun, Georgian leader Zviad Gamsakhurdia, a noted author and scholar of the iconic Georgian poet Shota Rustaveli, was elected president of Georgia.
(AP, 3/28/07)
1991 Sex selective abortions began increasing in the Caucasus region as ultrasound equipment became available from the West. By 2013 over 115 boys were born in Armenia and Azerbaijan for every 100 girls. In Georgia the ration was 120 to 100.
(Econ, 9/21/13, p.54)
1992 Jan 6, After two weeks of fighting, ousted Georgian President Zviad Gamsakhurdia fled the capital, Tbilisi.
(AP, 1/6/02)
1992 Jul, Russia brokered a cease fire between South Ossetia and Georgia.
(SFC, 9/1/98, p.A10)(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A12)
1992 In Georgia Eduard Shevardnadze, former Soviet foreign minister, was elected speaker of Parliament and the became the country's leader.
(WSJ, 11/6/95, p.A-1)(SFC, 11/24/03, p.A11)
1992 In Tbilisi, Georgia, the central-heating system went out of service. Carbon-monoxide poisonings began as residents turned to wood and gas stoves.
(AP, 2/5/05)
1992-1993 Separatists in the northwestern province of Abkhazia took over control by war. War between Abkhaz forces and Georgians killed 10,000 and left the Black Sea region as a de facto independent but unrecognized state. In the siege of Sukhumi Abkhaz rebels encircled the capital of the region.
(SFC, 2/21/98, p.A10)(SFC, 5/26/98, p.A8)(WSJ, 11/18/06, p.P11)
1993 Mar 19, Georgia shot down a Russian warplane over the separatist Abkhazia region, killing its pilot and heightening tensions.
(AP, 3/19/03)
1993 Aug 8, Freddie Woodruff (b.1947), CIA agent chief in Tbilisi, Georgia, was shot and killed during an outing with friends. Georgian authorities charged Anzor Sharmaidze (20), a volunteer soldier, with the murder. Sharmaidze confessed under torture and later said he was framed for the murder. In 2008 Sharmaidze was granted parole from prison.
(http://public.cq.com/docs/hs/hsnews110-000002604568.html)(WSJ, 10/18/08, p.A1)(WSJ, 10/27/08, p.a12)
1993 Sep 22, An aircraft operated by Transair Georgia was shot down by Abkhazian separatist forces. It crashed onto the runway and caught fire, killing 108.
(AP, 6/11/13)
1993 Dec 3, Georgia became a member of Russia's Commonwealth of Independent States; Russia, in return, backed Shevardnadze against Abkhaz rebels.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_Independent_States)
1993 Dec 31, Former Georgian President Zviad Gamsakhurdia (b.1939) died on New Year’s Eve. He had returned to lead an uprising in western Georgia, but the fighting was quickly put down and Gamsakhurdia was surrounded. His body was then taken to Chechnya. In 2007 His body was returned for burial in Georgia.
(AP, 3/28/07)
1994 Nov, Abkhazia declared independence from Georgia and set up its own government. No other country gave recognition. Residents of the area numbered about 200,000 and spoke their own language. Vladislav Ardzinba became president.
(SSFC, 9/24/06, p.A20)(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3261059.stm)
1994 Georgia reached a cease-fire with Abkhazia.
(SFC, 11/24/03, p.A11)
1995 Aug 29, In Tbilisi, Georgia, the motorcade of Eduard Shevardnadze was attacked as he left for the ceremonial signing of the new constitution.
(SFC, 2/10/98, p.A12)
1995 Eduard Shevardnadze was elected president of Georgia for a 5-year term after the country adopted a new constitution.
(SFC, 11/24/03, p.A11)
1996 Apr, Shevardnadze signed a cooperation agreement with Azerbaijan and Armenia.
(http: ICL)
1996 Jul 19, Peacekeeping mandate of Russia in the Abkhaz conflict was due to expire.
(http: ICL)
1996 Jul, After having secured a new resolution of support from the United Nations Security Council, Shevardnadze started talks to Abkhaz leader Vladislav Ardzinba.
(http: ICL)
1997 Jan 9, The government informed the US that diplomat Georgui Makharadze would be recalled following his involvement in a car crash that left a 16-year-old Washington girl dead. Police evidence strongly suggested that he had been drinking.
(SFC, 1/10/96, p.A2)
1997 Oct 8, Gueorgui Makharadze, a diplomat from the Republic of Georgia, pleaded guilty in Washington to charges stemming from a car crash that killed Maryland teen-ager Jovianne Waltrick. Makharadze was sentenced to seven years in prison; he initially served his term in a US prison, but was later transferred to Georgia, where he was paroled in 2002.
(AP, 10/8/07)
1997 Former Soviet republics (Georgia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan and Moldova) formed Guuam to seek cooperation outside Russian influence.
(WSJ, 3/4/05, p.A13)
1997 Rocket-propelled grenades slammed the armor-plated Mercedes of Pres. Shevardnadze and 2 bodyguards were killed.
(SFC, 8/31/98, p.A8)
1998 Feb 9, In Tbilisi armed attackers ambushed Pres. Shevardnadze (70). One attacker and one bodyguard were killed.
(SFC, 2/10/98, p.A12)
1998 Feb 19, Gunmen kidnapped 4 UN observers and 6 civilians and demanded the release of 7 suspects held for last week’s assassination attempt on Pres. Shevardnadze.
(WSJ, 2/20/98, p.A1)
1998 Feb 25, The UN prisoners were freed and the leader of the kidnapping group escaped.
(WSJ, 2/26/98, p.A1)
1998 Apr 21, It was reported that the US and Britain have begun a secretive removal of nuclear materials near Tbilisi. Britain volunteered to accept the material.
(SFC, 4/21/98, p.A18)
1998 May 25, Fighting between Abkhaz forces and Georgian irregulars raged inside a Russian patrolled buffer zone despite an agreed 1993 cease-fire. Georgia later claimed that 100 people died and that 38,000 Georgians were driven from their homes.
(SFC, 5/26/98, p.A8)(WSJ, 5/26/98, p.A1)(WSJ, 5/28/98, p.A1)
1998 Oct 19, In Georgia an army mutiny failed after 200 troops opposed to Pres. Shevardnadze surrendered. 4 rebels and one government soldier were killed.
(WSJ, 10/20/98, p.A1)
1998 Oct 29, Five nations endorsed the oil pipeline from the Caspian to the Mediterranean Sea. Turkey, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakstan and Uzbekistan committed to the 1,080 mile conduit with a push from the US.
(SFC, 10/30/98, p.A14)
1998 Dec 24, In Tbilisi, Georgia, gunmen killed Greek diplomat Anastasius Mizitrasos.
(SFC, 12/25/98, p.A19)
1999 Oct 13, In Georgia gunmen seized 6 UN observers and a translator as they delivered aid to Abkhazia. 4 of the observers were released the next day and the ransom was raised to $350,000. The last of the hostages were released 2 days later.
(SFC, 10/14/99, p.A14)(SFC, 10/15/99, p.D3)(SFC, 10/16/99, p.A16)
1999 Nov 8, Pope John Paul II stopped to "build new bridges" with the Orthodox Church and Patriarch Ilia II. Separately Prime Minister Shevardnadze's party won the recent parliamentary elections.
(SFC, 11/9/99, p.A14)(WSJ, 11/9/99, p.A1)
1999 Nov 17, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey agreed to a US-backed plan for a Caspian oil pipeline from Baku to Ceyhan to be completed in 2004. The 1st shipment was made in 2006.
(SFC, 11/18/99, p.C6)(AFP, 6/4/06)
1999 Nov 23, An agreement between Georgia and Russia was announced to cut the number of Russian forces over the next few years.
(SFC, 11/24/99, p.C5)
2000 Apr 9, In Georgia Pres. Eduard Shevardnadze won re-election with some 82% of the vote. Dzhumber Patiashvili, ex-Communist leader, trailed with 17% and charged that there was widespread vote rigging.
(SFC, 4/10/00, p.A16)
2000 Jun 1, Abkhaz officials reported that 5 members of a UN observer mission were missing.
(SFC, 6/3/00, p.A12)
2000 Aug 4, In Georgia three Red Cross workers were believed to have been kidnapped. Their car was found the next day near the border with Chechnya.
(SFC, 8/7/00, p.C16)(WSJ, 8/7/00, p.A1)
2001 May 25, In Georgia some 400 National Guard mutinied over improved living conditions at a base 25 miles northeast of Tbilisi.
(SFC, 5/26/01, p.A10)
2001 Oct 8, In the Abkhazia region of Georgia a UN helicopter was shot down and 9 people were killed.
(SFC, 10/9/01, p.B4)
2001 Oct 9, Abkhazia accused Chechen and Georgian fighters of killing 14 villagers and mounting a helicopter raid.
(WSJ, 10/10/01, p.A1)
2001 Oct 30, In Tbilisi the state security ministry sent 30 agents to the independent Rustavi 2 TV station, ostensibly for a tax investigation. The director refused the examination of financial files and put the standoff on the air which prompted 5-10 thousand people to gather in protest. Security Minister Vakhtang Kutateladze was later fired by Pres. Shevardnadze.
(SFC, 11/2/01, p.D2)
2001 Nov 1, In Georgia Pres. Shevardnadze fired his government as demonstrators took to the streets and demanded changes.
(SFC, 11/2/01, p.D2)
2001 Dec, Abandoned Soviet nuclear batteries were found by woodsmen in the mountains of Abkhazia near Dzhvari filled with strontium 90. Experts removed the devices Feb 5.
(SFC, 2/1/02, p.A14)(SFC, 2/5/02, p.A6)
2001 An expedition to the Krubera cave in Voronja, Georgia, measured its depth at 5,610 feet, making it the world's deepest known cave.
(NG, Feb, 04)
2002 Feb 26, It was reported that the US has begun providing the former Soviet Republic of Georgia with military aid to counter terrorist threats in the Pankisi Gorge region. Some 100-200 US soldiers were included in the $64 million program to begin in mid-March.
(SFC, 2/27/02, p.A8)(SFC, 3/2/02, p.A11)
2002 Mar 21, It was reported that Georgian fighters expected to use their US training against secessionists in Abkhazia, which was unofficially protected by Russia.
(SFC, 3/21/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr 12, Russia sent troops into the Kodori gorge of Georgia to watch the Abkhazia border. The move was condemned by Georgian officials and troops were soon withdrawn.
(SFC, 4/13/02, p.A11)(WSJ, 4/15/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr 25, An earthquake in Tbilisi, Georgia, killed at least 3 people.
(SFC, 4/26/02, p.A15)
2002 Apr 29, The 1st 20 of some 2000 US soldiers landed in the former Soviet republic of Georgia.
(SFC, 4/30/02, p.A14)
2002 May 19, A team of 50 US Green Berets landed in Tbilisi for a 2-year training program for Georgia’s army.
(SFC, 5/20/02, p.A14)
2002 May, Pres. Shevardnadze of Georgia issued a decree ordering new measures to insure the rights of worshippers. He denounced the last 3 years of violence against new religions including Jehovah’s Witnesses. Only the Orthodox Church had special status and tax exemption.
(SFC, 8/17/02, p.A8)
2002 Aug 23, Pres. Shevardnadze accused Russia of bombing inside Georgia’s border. One person was reported killed.
(SFC, 8/24/02, p.A7)
2002 Sep 11, In Russia Pres. Putin threatened military strikes on Georgia to defend itself from terrorist attacks.
(SFC, 9/12/02, p.A7)
2002 Sep 23, Georgia's president sought to defuse an explosive war of words with Russia, offering to let Moscow send unarmed military observers to the mountain valley where Russia says terrorists are operating.
(AP, 9/23/02)
2002 Oct 22, It was reported that special forces in the Pankisi Gorge of Georgia had captured 15 Arab militants linked to al Qaeda.
(SFC, 10/22/02, p.A7)
2002 Nov 3, Dzhumber Lezhava returned to Tbilisi, Georgia, ending a nine-year trip around the world by bicycle.
(AP, 11/3/02)
2002 Russia changed its citizenship law to allow massive distribution of passports to people in the Abkhazia and South Ossetia regions of Georgia.
(Econ, 10/3/09, p.65)
2003 Mar 24, In Georgia Pres. Shevardnadze confirmed that the US was flying U-2 spy planes over the Pankisi Gorge area to help fight Chechen rebel infiltration.
(WSJ, 3/25/03, p.A1)
2003 Aug 18, All of Georgia was without power for the entire day, and officials in the impoverished former Soviet republic were struggling to determine the cause of the blackout.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Sep 19, The government of Georgia scrapped an accord guaranteeing religious freedom for Catholics. The next day the Vatican issued an unusually strong rebuke to the former Soviet republic and its dominant Orthodox Church.
(AP, 9/20/03)
2003 Nov 2, Georgia held parliamentary elections and opinion polls said the opposition would take control unless there was massive fraud. Parliamentary candidates allied with Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze held a slim lead in elections that European monitors said were marred by irregularities.
(SFC, 11/3/03, p.A3)(AP, 11/4/03)
2003 Nov 5, In Georgia opposition parties protested for a 2nd day, accusing President Eduard Shevardnadze's government of rigging the results of parliamentary elections.
(AP, 11/5/03)
2003 Nov 22, Opposition supporters broke into Georgia's Parliament and took it over, scuffling with lawmakers and forcing President Eduard Shevardnadze to flee as thousands of protesters outside demanded his resignation.
(AP, 11/22/03)
2003 Nov 23, Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze signed his resignation papers as leaders of protesters already occupying parliament urged tens of thousands of supporters to seize more organs of state power and some military units defected to the jubilant protesters thronging the capital's streets. Nino Burdzhanadze, leader of the United Democrats opposition, declared herself acting president and announced a new election within 45 days.
(AP, 11/23/03)(SSFC, 11/23/03, p.A3)
2003 Nov 25, Georgian lawmakers set a new presidential election for Jan 4. The foreign debt stood at $1.8 billion, the unemployment rate was 30% and the average monthly salary was $20.
(AP, 11/25/03)(SFC, 11/26/03, p.A13)
2003 Nov 26, In Georgia Mikhail Saakashvili (35), a US educated lawyer, said he would run for president as the sole candidate of the opposition National Movement party. His campaign later became known as the “rose revolution."
(SFC, 11/27/03, p.A9)(Econ, 11/17/07, p.16)
2003 Dec 10, Aslan Abashidze (65), a former Soviet bureaucrat who has ruled the region of Adzharia since Georgia's 1991 independence, refused to accept Georgia's interim leadership or parliament.
(AP, 12/10/03)
2003 Dec 29, A Georgia rocket attack damaged offices of an independent TV station.
(WSJ, 12/30/03, p.A1)
2004 Jan 4, The former Soviet republic of Georgia voted for a successor to President Eduard Shevardnadze. Mikhail Saakashvili, Georgia's young firebrand opposition leader, declared himself the victor in presidential elections with some 85% of the vote.
(AP, 1/5/04)(SFC, 1/5/04, p.A3)
2004 Jan 8, Authorities in Georgia's autonomous region of Adzharia imposed a state of emergency, fearing the newly elected Georgian president may try to rein in the province.
(AP, 1/8/04)
2004 Jan 18, In Georgia an explosion at a scientific institute in Tbilisi killed two people and injured two others. It occurred during a transfer of nitrogen, an indication that a canister of the gas could have blown up.
(AP, 1/19/04)
2004 Jan 25, Mikhail Saakashvili was inaugurated as Georgia's president.
(AP, 1/25/05)
2004 Feb 26, Mikhail Saakashvili, the new president of Georgia, said he is ready to negotiate full autonomy for the separatist Abkhazia region to end the decade-long conflict.
(AP, 2/26/04)
2004 Mar 14, Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili put the country's military on alert after the restive Adzharia region barred him from entering.
(AP, 3/14/04)
2004 Mar 15, Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili put trade restrictions on Adzharia (Ajaria) after Aslan Abashidze ignored a deadline to accept federal authority.
(AP, 3/14/04)
2004 Mar 18, Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili met with Aslan Abashidze in Batumi, Ajaria, to settle misunderstandings.
(Econ, 3/20/04, p.54)
2004 Mar 19, Georgia's authorities lifted sanctions against the defiant Adzharia (Ajaria) region, carrying out a new agreement aimed to avert tensions.
(AP, 3/19/04)
2004 Mar 28, Georgians voted in the country's third election in less than six months. Supporters of President Mikhail Saakashvili swept to victory in Georgia's parliamentary election, according to early results.
(AP, 3/28/04)(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Apr 2, Georgian authorities reported that they had detained four men on suspicion of plotting to assassinate the president, and officials accused the autonomous province of Adzharia (Ajaria) of being behind the alleged plot.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 19, The annual environmental Goldman Prizes were awarded in SF. Winners included Manana Kochladze of Georgia for winning concessions to protect villagers and a pristine gorge from an oil pipeline.
(SFC, 4/19/04, p.B5)
2004 May 2, Adzharian (Ajaria) forces blew up the three major bridges connecting their recalcitrant province with the rest of Georgia in what their leader said was a preventive measure against Georgian military action.
(AP, 5/2/04)
2004 May 5, Russian foreign minister Igor Ivanov helped ease Aslan Abashidze out of Adzharia (Ajaria), Georgia.
(Econ, 5/8/04, p.49)
2004 May 6, The leader of the breakaway region of Adzharia fled after street protests, and Georgia's president flew into the restive province, vowing to pursue the integration of two other separatist regions.
(AP, 5/6/04)
2004 May, Georgia’s Pres. Saakashvili asked Kakha Bendukidze (48), industrialist, to return to Georgia from Russia and serve as the new economy minister. Bendukidze returned in June and began work.
(Econ, 7/31/04, p.56)
2004 Aug 15, Sporadic gunfire and shelling took place overnight in the disputed Georgian region of South Ossetia in violation of a fragile ceasefire, wounding seven Georgian servicemen.
(AFP, 8/15/04)
2004 Aug 17, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili appealed to world leaders to convene an international conference on the conflict in breakaway South Ossetia, where daily exchanges of gunfire threaten to spark a war. The province operated as a conduit for smuggling between Georgia and Russia.
(AP, 8/17/04)(Econ, 8/21/04, p.40)
2004 Aug 18, In South Ossetia 3 Georgian peacekeepers were killed in overnight shooting.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Dec 5, In Abkhazia (Georgia) the two candidates vying for the region's presidency agreed to conduct new elections and run on a joint ticket.
(AP, 12/6/04)
2004 Irakly Okruashvili, Georgia’s interior minister, sacked some 12,000 police officers as part of a major anti-corruption drive.
(Econ, 9/18/04, p.56)
2004 Georgia’s Pres. Saakashvili installed Levan Varshalomidze to replace Aslan Abashidze as head of the Ajaria region.
(Econ, 8/20/05, p.42)
2005 Feb 1, In Gori, Georgia, a car bomb exploded outside a police station, killing three policemen and injuring 13 other people.
(AP, 2/1/05)
2005 Feb 3, PM Zurab Zhvania, who helped lead Georgia's revolution that toppled the corruption-tainted regime of Eduard Shevardnadze, died in a friend's apartment from what officials claimed was an accidental gas leak from a heater.
(AP, 2/3/05)
2005 Feb 17, Georgia’s parliament approved Zurab Nogaideli as premier.
(WSJ, 2/18/05, p.A1)
2005 Mar 10, Georgia lawmakers voted unanimously for Russia to withdraw troops from soviet-era bases by Jan 1.
(WSJ, 3/11/05, p.A1)
2005 May 9, In Tbilisi Pres. Bush, before a cheering crowd of tens of thousands of people, said that the former Soviet republic of Georgia is proving to the world that determined people can rise up and claim their freedom from oppressive rulers.
(AP, 5/9/05)
2005 May 10, Cheered by tens of thousands in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, President Bush urged the spread of democracy across the former communist world and beyond.
(AP, 5/10/06)
2005 May 25, In Azerbaijan officials opened the first section of a $3.6 billion, 1,100-mile pipeline that will carry Caspian Sea oil to Western markets. The presidents of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Georgia and Turkey were on hand for the ceremony at the Sangachal oil terminal.
(AP, 5/25/05)(WSJ, 5/25/05, p.B2)
2005 May 30, Russia agreed to begin withdrawing its troops from two Soviet-era bases in Georgia this year, resolving one of the most serious disputes between Moscow and its pro-Western neighbor.
(AP, 5/30/05)
2005 Aug 2, Georgia’s Pres, Saakashvili said he is counting on US help to facedown Moscow and reassert control over Abkhazia and Southern Ossetia.
(WSJ, 8/2/05, p.A1)
2005 Aug 12, Leaders of Georgia and Ukraine called for an alliance that would champion democracy in the former Soviet lands.
(AP, 8/12/05)
2005 Sep 10, More than 500 U.S.-trained Georgian soldiers left for Iraq as part of a regular rotation of troops by the former Soviet republic.
(AP, 9/10/05)
2005 Nov 23, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili predicted his country will become a member of the Western military alliance NATO by 2009.
(Reuters, 11/24/05)
2006 Jan 11, In Georgia a court convicted a man of trying to assassinate President Bush and the leader of Georgia during a rally last year, and it sentenced him to life in prison. Vladimir Arutyunian (27) also was convicted of killing a policeman during a shootout while authorities were trying to arrest him several weeks after the May 10, 2005, grenade incident.
(AP, 1/11/06)
2006 Jan 22, Explosions hit pipelines running through southern Russia, cutting the natural gas supply to Georgia and Armenia during a cold snap.
(AP, 1/22/06)
2006 Jan 22, Georgia began receiving natural gas late in the day from Azerbaijan following explosions on pipelines in southern Russia that cut off delivery of gas to Georgia and its neighbor Armenia during a cold snap.
(AP, 1/23/06)
2006 Jan 24, Georgia’s energy minister said Iran has expressed a readiness to export natural gas to Georgia to make up for a sharp drop in Russian deliveries.
(AP, 1/24/06)
2006 Jan 27, Georgia's president said that Iran had agreed to start providing emergency gas supplies to the Caucasus mountain nation as early as this weekend, signaling an end to an energy crisis made worse by an extreme cold snap.
(AP, 1/27/06)
2006 Jan 29, Russia resumed sending natural gas to Georgia after finishing repairs to a major pipeline damaged by mysterious blasts a week earlier.
(AP, 1/29/06)
2006 Mar 9, About 8,000 Georgians took to the streets for the capital's biggest anti-government demonstration since President Mikhail Saakashvili was swept to power after leading the Rose Revolution protests more than two years ago.
(AP, 3/9/06)
2006 Mar 26, Georgian police stormed a prison in Tbilisi after inmates rioted in an escape attempt from Ortochala prison, sparking a gun battle that left two guards and an unknown number of inmates dead.
(AP, 3/27/06)
2006 Apr 6, It was reported that Russian health and sanitary officials had imposed a ban on Georgian and Moldovan wines effective May 1. Authorities said the wines contained pesticides and heavy metals. The ban was soon extended to brandy and sparkling wines.
(AP, 4/6/06)
2006 May 28, A new $4 billion pipeline from Baku, via Georgia to Ceyhan, Turkey, began pumping oil.
(Econ, 6/3/06, p.48)
2006 Jun 3, The long-awaited first shipment of Caspian oil from the new Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline got on its way from a Turkish port.
(AFP, 6/4/06)
2006 Jul 5, Pres. Bush met with Pres. Saakashvili and backed Georgia’s bid to join NATO.
(WSJ, 7/6/06, p.A1)
2006 Jul 6, Four former officers in Georgia's Interior Ministry were convicted of causing bodily harm leading to death in the case of a banker, Sandro Girgvliani (28), whose beating and stabbing death became a political scandal in this former Soviet republic.
(AP, 7/6/06)
2006 Jul 13, The presidents of Turkey, Azerbaijan and Georgia formally opened a pipeline designed to bypass Russia and bring Caspian oil to Europe, a route that President Bush said would bolster global energy security.
(AP, 7/13/06)
2006 Jul 26, Georgian authorities reported sporadic fighting in a mountainous region where police are trying to subdue a defiant militia leader, the latest confrontation in a volatile former Soviet republic plagued by separatist movements.
(AP, 7/26/06)
2006 Jul 27, Georgia’s Pres. Saakashvili said his troops had established control over the Kodori Gorge area after Emzar Kvitsiani, a former presidential envoy, said he was reactivating a local militia.
(SFC, 7/28/06, p.A3)
2006 Aug 10, Rights activists said at least nine inmates have died in Georgian prisons in the past 10 days as the Caucasus Mountains nation suffers through high temperatures not seen in two decades.
(AP, 8/10/06)
2006 Sep 11, Leaders of the breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia said they would hold a referendum on independence in November, a move likely to infuriate the government in Tbilisi and stoke already spiraling tensions.
(AP, 9/11/06)
2006 Sep 29, Georgia charged four Russian military officers with spying, while Russian government planes evacuated dozens of diplomats and their relatives as the diplomatic dispute worsened between Moscow and the former Soviet republic.
(AP, 9/29/06)
2006 Sep 30, Russia said that it has suspended plans for further withdrawal of its troops from Georgia amid worsening relations between the two neighbors.
(AP, 9/30/06)
2006 Oct 2, Georgia released four Russian officers whose arrest on spying charges prompted Moscow to announce sweeping travel and communications sanctions in the worst bilateral crisis in years.
(AP, 10/2/06)
2006 Oct 3, Russia suspended all transport and postal links with Georgia until further notice, sharply escalating their dispute. The blockade caused economic problems for Armenia, Georgia's landlocked southern neighbor, since Russia is its main trading partner.
(AP, 10/3/06)(AP, 10/7/06)
2006 Oct 5, Georgians voted in municipal elections seen as a crucial test for President Mikhail Saakashvili during a diplomatic crisis with Russia.
(AP, 10/5/06)
2006 Oct 5, Russia froze Georgians’ work permits and nearly doubled its gas bill.
(WSJ, 10/6/06, p.A1)
2006 Oct 6, Opposition leaders alleged that Georgia's local and regional elections were riddled with fraud, but international monitors said the balloting was conducted "with general respect for fundamental freedoms."
(AP, 10/6/06)
2006 Oct 12, Georgia blocked the next round of talks on Russia's bid to join the World Trade Organization in retaliation for Moscow's blockade of its small southern neighbor.
(AP, 10/12/06)
2006 Oct 24, Georgia's Foreign Ministry said it had protested to the UN about Russia's crackdown on illegal Georgian migrants, demanding a stop to what it called "persecution on ethnic grounds."
(AP, 10/24/06)
2006 Oct 26, A Georgian man was killed and another was wounded when they stepped on a mine in a volatile area near the breakaway province of South Ossetia.
(AP, 10/26/06)
2006 Nov 2, Russia's state-controlled natural gas monopoly said that it would more than double the price it charges Georgia, further heightening tensions between the ex-Soviet neighbors.
(AP, 11/2/06)
2006 Nov 12, Voters in the breakaway Georgian province of South Ossetia declared overwhelming backing for its independence drive in a referendum that underlined a sharp split between Russia and the West and is likely to increase tensions in the Caucasus region. A similar 1992 referendum proclaiming the province's independence went unnoticed by the international community, leaving it in limbo.
(AP, 11/12/06)(AP, 11/13/06)
2006 Dec 14, In Georgia the last train carrying military hardware and property owned by units of the Group of Russian Troops left the Tbilisi garrison for Armenia. The last of Russia’s servicemen were to leave the next day. This ended a 200-year-old Russian presence in Tbilisi.
(www.interfax.ru/e/B/politics/28.html?id_issue=11647105)
2006 Dec 22, A top executive with Russian gas giant OAO Gazprom said Georgia will pay more than double what it pays now for Russian natural gas under a new agreement.
(AP, 12/22/06)
2006 Thomas Goltz authored “Georgia Diary: A Chronicle of War and Political Chaos in the Post-Soviet Caucasus."
(WSJ, 11/18/06, p.P11)
2006 A Georgian undercover agent made contact with a Russian seller of uranium in North Ossetia. The seller was arrested when they met in Tbilisi with 3.5 ounces of enriched uranium, which made it weapons grade material.
(SFC, 1/25/07, p.A18)
2007 Jan 18, President Vladimir Putin ordered Russia's ambassador to Georgia to return to the Georgian capital after recalling him four months ago, saying that the two countries must "normalize" badly strained ties.
(AP, 1/18/07)
2007 Feb 7, Georgia signed a regional cooperation agreement with Azerbaijan and Turkey which included plans for a railway connecting the three countries.
(WSJ, 2/28/07, p.A6)(http://tinyurl.com/2gbbgg)
2007 Mar 5, Badri Patarkatsishvili, one of the most famous Georgian oligarchs, left Georgia. His departure was announced in London as the relocation of his activities of "Georgia in the West," underscoring the desire to leave the country definitively. The millionaire, who holds first-rank influence in both finances and the media, co-holds one of the most important Georgian media concerns, Imedi, which includes a radio station and a television station.
(www.caucaz.com/home_eng/breve_contenu.php?id=307)
2007 Mar 11, In Georgia’s Kodori Valley Russian helicopters coordinated a ground and air attack on 3 settlements and fired a guided missile at a Georgian government building.
(WSJ, 1/5/07, p.A8)
2007 Apr, Georgia reported that outbreaks of African swine fever began at the end of April in 10 regions across the country. 20,000 pigs were soon slaughtered. In June the UN said that the outbreak could have a "catastrophic" economic impact unless its spread is halted.
(AP, 6/8/07)
2007 May 11, Authorities in Georgia's breakaway region of South Ossetia launched a blockade of all ethnic Georgian villages in the province and demanded that the central government withdraw its police troops from the settlements.
(AP, 5/11/07)
2007 May 20, Guram Sharadze (67), the leader of a Georgian opposition movement, was gunned down on a street in a central part of the capital, Tbilisi.
(AP, 5/20/07)
2007 Jun 19, Georgia border agents blocked a car trying to smuggle radioactive plutonium and beryllium from Azerbaijan.
(WSJ, 6/20/07, p.A1)
2007 Jun 28, Hundreds of ethnic Georgians confronted Russian peacekeeping forces in the breakaway region of South Ossetia, throwing paint and gasoline on the troops and forcing them to stop blocking a road project.
(AP, 6/28/07)
2007 Aug 7, Georgia accused Russia of "undisguised aggression," saying two Russian fighter jets intruded on its airspace and fired a missile that landed near a house. Russia denied the allegation.
(AP, 8/7/07)
2007 Aug 24, Georgia said it fired on a Russian plane flying over its territory. The Tbilisi City Court, behind closed doors, convicted 13 people from minor opposition parties for plotting a violent overthrow of the government. Maia Topuria, the lead defendant and head of the pro-Moscow Justice party, was sentenced to 8 ½ years in prison.
(WSJ, 8/25/07, p.A1)(www.geotimes.ge/index.php?m=home&newsid=6353)
2007 Aug 25, A senior official of the separatist region said a plane of uncertain origin went down over Abkhazia, a day after Georgia reported that its forces fired on a plane believed to be Russian that had violated the country's airspace.
(AP, 8/25/07)
2007 Sep 14, Georgia’s defense minister said Georgia will cut the size of its military contingent in Iraq from 2,000 soldiers and other personnel to around 300 by next summer.
(AP, 9/14/07)
2007 Sep 20, A clash between Georgian and separatist Abkhazian forces too place some 330 yards inside Abkhaz-held territory. Several Abkhaz soldiers were wounded and 2 former Russian military officers were killed.
(SFC, 10/30/07, p.A6)
2007 Sep 27, Irakli Okruashvili, Georgia's hawkish former defense minister, was detained on corruption charges, days after he alleged that President Mikhail Saakashvili had ordered him to kill a prominent businessman.
(AP, 9/27/07)
2007 Sep 28, Thousands of opposition supporters rallied in Georgia's capital, demanding that the president step down following the arrest of Irakly Okruashvili (33), a former defense minister who accused the leader of involvement in a murder plot.
(AP, 9/28/07)(Econ, 10/6/07, p.58)
2007 Oct 7, Irakly Okruashvili, Georgia's former defense minister, retracted allegations that the president of this former Soviet republic was involved in a murder plot and other corruption. Okruashvili's lawyer, Eka Beselia, said the statements "were made under duress."
(AP, 10/8/07)
2007 Oct 10, Ministers from Azerbaijan, Georgia, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine signed a deal to build an oil pipeline linking the Black and Baltic seas.
(WSJ, 10/11/07, p.A18)
2007 Oct 15, The Security Council voted unanimously to extend the UN observer mission in Georgia, expressing "serious concern" at violence that has escalated tensions between Georgia and the breakaway region of Abkhazia.
(AP, 10/15/07)
2007 Nov 7, In Georgia police forced dozens of opposition supporters from a site in Tbilisi, where five days of protests had drawn thousands, but demonstrators later returned and renewed their calls for the president's resignation. Georgia’s Imedi television station, regarded by the government as an opposition mouthpiece, went off the air after riot police entered its headquarters. Imedi was owned by opposition tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili. The government declared a 15-day state of emergency.
(AP, 11/7/07)(AP, 11/8/07)(Econ, 11/10/07, p.66)(Econ, 1/12/08, p.41)
2007 Nov 8, Georgia's pro-Western Pres. Mikhail Saakashvili said that the country would hold early presidential elections in January to defuse a crisis fueled by protests against him. Troops armed with hard rubber clubs patrolled the center of Tbilisi to enforce a state of emergency imposed after a violent crackdown on anti-government protesters.
(AP, 11/8/07)
2007 Nov 9, Georgian opposition leaders said they would end streets protests against President Mikhail Saakashvili after he called for an early presidential election for January.
(AP, 11/9/07)
2007 Nov 15, Georgia’s parliament lifted the country’s state of emergency imposed last week by Pres. Saakashvili.
(WSJ, 11/16/07, p.A1)
2007 Nov 15, A top Russian general said that Russia has completed its withdrawal of troops that had been based in Georgia since the Soviet collapse. He said peacekeepers remained in Abkhazia along with forces in South Ossetia with the participation of Georgia.
(AP, 11/14/07)
2007 Nov 16, Georgia’s President Mikhail Saakashvili dismissed the prime minister and nominated an influential banker for the post in an apparent attempt to win votes ahead of a hastily called presidential election.
(AP, 11/16/07)
2007 Nov 21, The presidents of Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey launched the construction of a railroad that will link ex-Soviet republics in the Caucasus and Central Asia with Europe, bypassing Russia.
(AP, 11/21/07)
2007 Dec 26, Georgia's top television station suspended its broadcasts, saying it was protesting the pressure authorities have exerted because of the station's links to a billionaire presidential contender challenging the government.
(AP, 12/26/07)
2007 Kakha Bendukidze, Georgian industrialist, founded the Free University of Tbilisi to teach law, business and languages. Each graduate was expected to finance a new student.
(Econ, 8/21/10, p.41)
2008 Jan 5, Georgians voted to determine whether to keep Mikhail Saakashvili as president in the former Soviet republic, where he was once considered a symbol of democratic reform but now faces accusations of authoritarian leanings. Saakashvili's supporters poured onto the streets, tooting car horns and waving white-and-red national flags, celebrating victory based on exit poll results. Saakashvili received 52.8% of the vote according to preliminary results.
(AP, 1/5/08)(AP, 1/6/08)(AP, 1/7/08)
2008 Jan 6, In Georgia several thousand people rallied in Tbilisi, claiming early election results that indicated Mikhail Saakashvili would narrowly win a second presidential term were fraudulent.
(AP, 1/6/08)
2008 Jan 7, President Mikhail Saakashvili said his re-election demonstrates that Georgia is on the road to becoming a European democracy, while his opponents denounced the vote as fraudulent and vowed to renew street protests.
(AP, 1/7/08)
2008 Jan 10, In Georgia authorities formally charged Badri Patarkatsishvili, a billionaire businessman, who ran in this month's presidential election with plotting to overthrow the government. Patarkatsishvili left Georgia in November and has spent time in Britain and Israel. He has acknowledged offering large sums of money to police if they side with protesters.
(AP, 1/11/08)
2008 Jan 13, In Georgia tens of thousands of opposition supporters rallied in Tbilisi to protest what they denounced as massive vote fraud that helped US-allied Mikhail Saakashvili win a second presidential term.
(AP, 1/13/08)
2008 Jan 15, In Georgia tens of thousands of people demonstrated in Tbilisi, pressing for a presidential runoff but celebrating an agreement giving the opposition more control over the main state-funded television station.
(AP, 1/15/08)
2008 Feb 12, Badri Patarkatsishvili (52), a Georgian tycoon, was found dead in his mansion near London. Police said they were treating the death as suspicious. He had claimed he was the target of assassination plot after helping lead anti-government protests in his homeland. He had built his fortune in Russia, where he became Berezovsky's business partner. However, the two men claimed in British court documents that the Russian government forced them to sell their stakes in oil company Sibneft, Russian Aluminum and television channel ORT for a fraction of their value. Interim tests indicated that Patarkatsishvili died of natural causes.
(AP, 2/13/08)(AP, 2/14/08)
2008 Mar 5, South Ossetia appealed for international recognition as an independent nation, further adding to simmering tensions in Georgia and throughout the strategic South Caucasus region.
(AP, 3/6/08)
2008 Mar 6, A lawmaker said Abkhazia, a region that broke away from Georgian government control in the 1990s, intends to seek international recognition as an independent nation, citing Kosovo as a precedent.
(AP, 3/6/08)
2008 Mar 25, Air travel between Georgia and Russia resumed, more than 17 months after Moscow suspended flights because of tension between the ex-Soviet neighbors.
(AP, 3/25/08)
2008 Apr 3, President Bush won NATO's endorsement for his plan to build a missile defense system in Europe over Russian objections. The proposal also advanced with Czech officials announcing an agreement to install a missile tracking site for the system in their country. NATO decided not to put Georgia and Ukraine on track to join the alliance after vehement Russian opposition, but the alliance pledged that the strategically important Black Sea nations will become members one day.
(AP, 4/3/08)
2008 Apr 20, A Georgian unmanned reconnaissance flight was shot down over the Georgian rebel region of Abkhazia. The next day Georgia's air force commander said a Russian fighter jet shot down the spy plane as it flew over Abkhazia, but Russia said it had been shot down by separatist forces and that the flight violated UN ceasefire agreements. A UN report on May 26 said a Russian jet shot down the spy drone.
(Reuters, 4/22/08)(AP, 4/22/08)(SFC, 5/27/08, p.A12)
2008 Apr 29, Russia announced it was beefing up its peacekeeping force in Georgia's breakaway Abkhazia and South Ossetia regions, saying it had evidence Tbilisi was readying its forces for an attack.
(Reuters, 4/29/08)
2008 May 1, Russia said an extra contingent of its troops had begun arriving in Georgia's breakaway region of Abkhazia, a move Tbilisi said was an illegal act of military aggression.
(AP, 5/1/08)
2008 May 4, Abkhazian anti-aircraft forces shot down 2 unmanned Georgian spy planes. A Georgian Foreign Ministry official, dismissed the claims as "completely absurd disinformation" aimed at increasing tension in the area.
(AP, 5/4/08)
2008 May 8, Georgia's breakaway region of Abkhazia said it had shot down another Georgian spy drone.
(Reuters, 5/8/08)
2008 May 21, Georgia held parliamentary elections.
(AP, 5/22/08)
2008 May 22, Partial returns and an exit poll showed President Mikhail Saakashvili's ruling party heading for a strong majority in Georgia's parliamentary election. United Opposition co-leader David Gamkrelidze alleged widespread cheating and pressure on opponents by authorities in areas outside Tbilisi.
(AP, 5/22/08)
2008 May, Georgia’s population, as it aspired to NATO membership, was about 4.5 million.
(Econ, 5/24/08, p.70)
2008 Jun 5, The European Parliament called for the peacekeeping mandate for Russian troops in the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia to be revised. The chamber also demanded the EU sends its own border mission into the conflict zone in Abkhazia.
(AP, 6/5/08)
2008 Jun 6, Russia's new Pres. Medvedev met with leaders of a fractious alliance of ex-Soviet republics, warning Ukraine and Georgia not to lead their countries into NATO.
(AP, 6/6/08)
2008 Jul 29, Russian proxies in South Ossetia started shelling pro-Georgian villages there.
(Econ, 1/23/10, p.78)
2008 Aug 2, Overnight fighting that included sniper and mortar fire between Georgian forces and separatists in the breakaway South Ossetia region left six people dead and 13 wounded.
(AP, 8/2/08)
2008 Aug 3, The breakaway republic of South Ossetia began sending hundreds of children across the border to its Russian ally amid increasing violence between the republic and Georgian government forces.
(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 7, Heavy shelling overnight in the Georgian breakaway province of South Ossetia wounded at least 21 people. Cyber attacks from Russia began to target Georgian government Web sites. An organization known as the Russian Business Network was the leading suspect in the attacks. Georgia’s Pres. Saakashvili ordered the shelling of Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia.
(AP, 8/7/08)(WSJ, 8/12/08, p.A9)(Econ, 8/30/08, p.49)
2008 Aug 8, Georgian troops launched a major military offensive to regain control of South Ossetia, prompting a furious response from Russia, which sent tanks into the region. The convoy was expected to reach the provincial capital by evening. Georgia said it shot down two Russian combat planes. Separatist officials in South Ossetia said 15 civilians had been killed in fighting overnight. Georgia later acknowledged that it used M85 cluster munition near the Roki tunnel that connects South Ossetia with Russia, while Russia denied use of cluster bombs.
(AP, 8/8/08)(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Aug 9, Georgia, the third largest contributor to the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq, said it's pulling out its 2,000-strong contingent from Iraq to join the fighting in the breakaway province of South Ossetia.
(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 9, Separatist forces in Georgia's breakaway province of Abkhazia launched air and artillery strikes to drive Georgian troops from their bridgehead in the region. The Abkhazian move was prompted by Georgia's military action to regain control over another breakaway province, South Ossetia.
(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 9, Russia sent hundreds of tanks and troops into the separatist province of South Ossetia and bombed Georgian towns in a major escalation of the conflict that has left scores of civilians dead and wounded. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told reporters in Moscow that some 1,500 people have been killed, with the death toll rising. The death toll in South Ossetia was later put at fewer than 200. Russian military aircraft bombed the Georgian town of Gori. Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili proposed a cease-fire. As part of his proposal, Georgian troops were pulled out of Tskhinvali and had been ordered to stop responding to Russian shelling.
(AP, 8/9/08)(Econ, 8/30/08, p.49)
2008 Aug 10, Georgian troops retreated from the breakaway province of South Ossetia and their government pressed for a truce, overwhelmed by Russian firepower as the conflict threatened to set off a wider war. Georgia said it has shot down 10 Russian planes, including four brought down Aug 9. It also claimed to have captured two Russian pilots, who were shown on Georgian television. Ukraine warned Russia it could bar Russian navy ships from returning to their base in the Crimea because of their deployment to Georgia's coast.
(AP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 11, Swarms of Russian jets launched new raids on Georgian territory and Georgia faced the threat of a second front of fighting as Russia demanded that Georgia disarm troops near the breakaway province of Abkhazia.
(AP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 12, Georgia's Pres. Mikhail Saakashvili said his government will declare that its breakaway regions are occupied territories and will designate Russian peacekeepers as occupying forces. Russia ordered a halt to military action in Georgia, after five days of air and land attacks sent Georgia's army into headlong retreat and left towns and military bases destroyed. A Dutch television journalist was killed overnight when Russian warplanes bombed the central Georgian city of Gori. Russia later counted 133 civilian deaths in South Ossetia. Rights activists later said fewer than 100 civilians were killed in South Ossetia. The war cost some 850 lives and left over 35,000 displaced civilians, mot of the Georgian.
(AP, 8/12/08)(Econ, 8/23/08, p.43)(WSJ, 9/12/08, p.A1)(Econ, 10/3/09, p.65)
2008 Aug 13, Russian tanks rolled into the crossroads city of Gori then thrust deep into Georgian territory, violating the truce designed to end the six-day war. Georgia said that 175 Georgians had died in five days of air and ground attacks that left homes in smoldering ruins. EU foreign ministers agreed in principle to send monitors to supervise a French-brokered ceasefire between Russia and Georgia in the breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia. Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin said Russia will spend at least $400 million in 2008 on restoring South Ossetia's battered capital Tskhinvali.
(AP, 8/13/08)(Reuters, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 14, Georgian and Russian troops faced off at a checkpoint outside the key city of Gori, calling an already shaky cease-fire into question. An American official said Russia appears to be sabotaging airfields and other military infrastructure as its forces pull back. The Russian General Prosecutor's office said it has formally opened a genocide probe into Georgian treatment of South Ossetians. For its part, Georgia this week filed a suit against Russia in the International Court of Justice, alleging murder, rape and mass expulsions in both provinces.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 15, Russian troops allowed some humanitarian supplies into Georgia’s city of Gori but kept up their blockade of the strategically located city, raising doubts about Russia's intentions. Relief planes swooped into Tbilisi with tons of supplies for the estimated 100,000 people uprooted by the fighting. An international rights group said it has evidence that Russian warplanes dropped cluster bombs in civilian areas in Georgia.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 16, Russian forces pulled back from the center of a town not far from Georgia's capital after Russia's president signed a cease-fire deal. Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov later suggested there would be no immediate broader withdrawal. Georgia's Foreign Ministry said Saturday that Russian-backed separatists from the province of Abkhazia had taken over 13 villages in Georgia and a power plant. Russian troops blew up a key railroad bridge linking the Caucasus to the Black Sea coast.
(AP, 8/16/08)(SSFC, 8/17/08, p.A4)
2008 Aug 17, The Kremlin promised to start withdrawing combat troops from Georgia on August 18, as Western pressure mounted on Russia to quit the ex-Soviet republic.
(AFP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 18, Russia said its military began to withdraw from the conflict zone in Georgia, but left unclear exactly where troops and tanks will operate under the cease-fire that ended days of fighting in the former Soviet republic.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 19, Russian soldiers took 20 Georgian troops prisoner at a key port in western Georgia and commandeered American Humvees awaiting shipment back to the United States after taking part in earlier US-Georgian military exercises. Georgia and Russia exchanged prisoners captured during their brief war.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 20, A top Russian general said 64 of the country's soldiers were killed and 323 wounded in this month's fighting with Georgia. Russia informed Norway that it plans to suspend all military ties with NATO, a day after the military alliance urged Moscow to withdraw its forces from Georgia. Georgia later reported that 170 of its soldiers were killed in the war.
(AP, 8/20/08)(AP, 8/21/08)(SSFC, 8/24/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 21, Russian forces blocked the only land entrance to Georgia's main port city, a day before Russia promised to complete a troop pullout from its ex-Soviet neighbor.
(AP, 8/21/08)
2008 Aug 22, A Russian armored column moved away from a base in western Georgia and Russian forces also were leaving the key central city of Gori, the day that Russia's president had said a pullback would be complete.
(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 23, A top Russian general said his country's forces will keep patrolling the key Georgian Black Sea port of Poti even though it lies outside the areas where Russia claims it has the right to station soldiers in Georgia.
(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 24, The USS McFaul, a US Navy warship carrying humanitarian aid, anchored at the Georgian port of Batumi, sending a strong signal of support to an embattled ally as Russian forces built up around two separatist regions. In central Georgia, an oil train exploded and caught fire, sending plumes of black smoke into the air. A Georgian official said the train hit a land mine and blamed the explosion on departing Russian forces.
(AP, 8/24/08)
2008 Aug 25, Russia's parliament voted unanimously to urge the president to recognize the independence of Georgia's two breakaway regions, a move likely to stoke further tensions between Moscow and the small Caucasus nation's Western allies. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev warned ex-Soviet Moldova against repeating Georgia's mistake of trying to use force to seize back control of Transdniestria, a pro-Moscow breakaway region.
(AP, 8/25/08)(Reuters, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 26, Russia formally recognized Abkhazia and South Ossetia, the breakaway Georgian territories at the heart of its war with Georgia, heightening tensions with the West as the US dispatched a military ship bearing aid to a port city still patrolled by Russian troops. In a direct challenge to Russia, the US announced it intends to deliver humanitarian aid to the beleaguered Georgian port city of Poti, which Russian troops still control through checkpoints on the city's outskirts.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 27, A US military ship docked at the southern Georgian port of Batumi. Meanwhile, Russia's missile cruiser, the Aurora, and two missile boats, anchored at the port of Sukhumi, the capital of Abkhazia. The moves by both sides underscored an escalating standoff between Moscow and the West over this small Caucasus nation devastated by war with Russia.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 27, The Group of Seven (G7) industrialized democracies condemned Russia for its actions in Georgia, underlining the country's growing estrangement from the West.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, Russian forces turned over 12 Georgian soldiers on the border of Abkhazia. Georgia's foreign minister said ethnic Georgians were being cleared from their homes in South Ossetia. A joint declaration from the Shanghai Cooperation Organization denounced the use of force and called for respect for every country's territorial integrity. Mikhail Mindzayev, the interior minister of South Ossetia, said an unmanned Georgian spy plane was shot down over South Ossetia by local forces.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 29, A Georgian Foreign Ministry official says Georgia is to recall all diplomatic staff from its embassy in Moscow because of the Russian military presence in Georgia.
(AP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 30, The UN says Russian soldiers are telling thousands of refugees in Georgia who want to return to their homes that their security can't be guaranteed. All hoped to return to villages that are in the "security zones" that Russia has claimed for itself. Russian PM Vladimir Putin urged the EU to ignore calls to punish Moscow over the Georgia conflict as Tbilisi appealed for targeted punishment of the Russian leadership.
(AP, 8/30/08)(AFP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 31, President Dmitry Medvedev says Russia will follow the recognition of Georgia's breakaway provinces with agreements on economic and military aid.
(AP, 8/31/08)
2008 Sep 1, Hundreds of thousands of Georgians joined together in anti-Russian protests.
(Econ, 9/6/08, p.32)
2008 Sep 3, A US Navy ship loaded with humanitarian aid steamed through the Dardanelles on its way to Georgia, as the Bush administration prepared to roll out a $1 billion economic aid package for the ex-Soviet republic.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 4, In Georgia US Vice President Dick Cheney condemned Russia for what he called an "illegitimate, unilateral attempt" to redraw this US ally's borders by force.
(AP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 5, The flagship of the US Navy's Mediterranean fleet anchored outside the key Georgian port of Poti, bringing in tons of humanitarian aid to a port still partially occupied by hundreds of Russian troops.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, EU nations called for an international probe to find out which country should shoulder responsibility for starting the conflict between Georgia and Russia.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 7, Italy's foreign minister, after meeting US Vice President Dick Cheney, said the EU wants to work closely with the United States in resolving the Georgian crisis.
(AP, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 8, French President Nicolas Sarkozy pressed Moscow to honor its pledge to withdraw troops from Georgia, while Russian soldiers prevented international aid convoys from visiting Georgian villages in a tense zone around the breakaway province of South Ossetia. Pres. Medvedev and Sarkozy revised the EU-brokered deal to end the fighting between Russia and Georgia. Medvedev said 200 EU monitors would deploy to regions surrounding South Ossetia and Abkhazia by next month. After that, Russian troops would pull out of those regions by Oct. 11 to a line that preceded last month's fighting.
(AP, 9/8/08)(AP, 9/9/08)
2008 Sep 9, Russia said it will station 7,600 troops in South Ossetia and in Abkhazia, announcing an imposing long-term presence less than a day after agreeing to pull forces back from areas surrounding the provinces.
(AP, 9/9/08)(WSJ, 9/10/08, p.A1)
2008 Sep 10, A Georgian police officer was killed by gunfire that came from the direction of a Russian checkpoint near separatist South Ossetia.
(AP, 9/10/08)
2008 Sep 10, Israeli defense officials say the government has told all businessmen involved in military sales to Georgia to immediately cease visits to the former Soviet republic. The officials said the directive was decided upon this week because Israel is concerned about damage to its relations with Russia.
(AP, 9/10/08)
2008 Sep 13, Hundreds of Russian forces packed up and withdrew from positions in western Georgia. A Georgian official said Russia had met a deadline for a partial pullout a month after the war between the two former Soviet republics. A Georgian policeman at a post near Abkhazia was killed by gunfire that came from the direction of a position where Abkhazian and Russian forces have been based. Some 1,200 Russian servicemen still remained at 19 checkpoints and other positions, 12 outside South Ossetia and seven outside Abkhazia.
(AP, 9/13/08)
2008 Sep 16, Georgia’s government said intercepted mobile phone calls show that Russian tanks and troops invaded before Georgia unleashed its offensive against South Ossetia, pressing its claim that Russia was the aggressor in the war last month.
(AP, 9/16/08)
2008 Sep 17, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev signed friendship treaties with Georgia's breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia and promised them the backing of Russia's armed forces.
(AP, 9/17/08)
2008 Sep 22, Georgian forces shot down a Russian drone near the breakaway province of South Ossetia.
(AP, 9/23/08)
2008 Sep 29, In Georgia almost 300 monitors from 22 EU nations were in place to oversee Russia's promised troop withdrawal from the large swaths it has occupied since the August war.
(AP, 9/29/08)
2008 Oct 1, EU monitors began patrolling Georgian territory and Russian troops allowed some of them into a buffer zone around the breakaway region of South Ossetia despite earlier warnings from Moscow they would be blocked.
(AP, 10/1/08)
2008 Oct 3, A car exploded outside the Russian military's headquarters in South Ossetia, killing 7 people and wounding 3. The South Ossetian government said a car, that had been confiscated in an ethnic Georgian village after weapons were found in it, exploded near a building where leaders of the Russian peacekeeping force were located.
(AP, 10/3/08)(www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,432172,00.html)
2008 Oct 5, A Georgian Interior Ministry official said Russian troops have begun dismantling positions in the so-called security zones inside Georgia that they have occupied since August's brief but intense war.
(AP, 10/5/08)
2008 Oct 8, Russian forces pulled back from positions outside South Ossetia, bulldozing a camp at a key checkpoint and withdrawing into the separatist region as EU monitors and relieved Georgian residents looked on.
(AP, 10/8/08)
2008 Oct 22, Officials said the EU, the US and other international donors have pledged more than $4.5 billion for rebuilding parts of Georgia that were damaged in its war with Russia.
(AP, 10/22/08)
2008 Oct 25, In Georgia an explosion killed Gia Mebonia, mayor of the small town of Mujhava, while he was inspecting a house damaged by overnight shelling near the separatist region of Abkhazia. A villager was also killed and a local police officer was seriously injured.
(AP, 10/25/08)
2008 Oct 27, Georgia's Pres. Saakashvili dismissed PM Vladimir Gurgenizde and recommended Grigol Mgaloblishvili (35), the country's ambassador to Turkey, as his replacement. Saakashvili said Gurgenizde would now head a government finance commission.
(AP, 10/27/08)
2008 Oct 29, Russia's parliament quickly ratified treaties cementing close economic and military ties with Georgia's two breakaway provinces.
(AP, 10/29/08)
2008 Nov 4, Human Rights Watch reported that both Georgia and Russia used cluster bombs during their brief summer war. Georgia’s bombs, purchased from Israel, killed at least 3 Georgian civilians, including 2 who touched unexploded bombs and died after the fighting ended. Many of the bombs were said to have malfunctioned.
(WSJ, 11/4/08, p.A12)
2008 Nov 7, In Georgia thousands of the United Opposition coalition demonstrated in the first major protest against President Mikhail Saakashvili since the August war with Russia. At least two significant opposition parties, The Republican Party and the Christian Democrats, stayed away from the protest, citing the need for postwar unity against Russia.
(AP, 11/7/08)
2008 Nov 10, An explosion killed two Georgian police officers near the disputed region of South Ossetia. EU monitors called the attack an unacceptable breach of the cease-fire that ended the Georgia-Russia war.
(AP, 11/10/08)
2008 Nov 15, A Georgian policeman was shot dead by a group of armed Abkhazians. The group was said to have entered Georgian-controlled territory to plant land mines. Abkhazian presidential envoy Ruslan Kishmariya said police from the separatist side killed one and wounded two Georgian "saboteurs" in the tense Gali district.
(AP, 11/15/08)
2008 Nov 19, Georgia and Russia held their first major, mediated talks since their August war.
(WSJ, 11/20/08, p.A1)
2008 Nov 20, Georgian officials said Russian and separatist forces attacked a Georgian police checkpoint near the village of Ganmukhuri, near the breakaway province of Abkhazia. Anatoly Zaitsev, the chief of staff for the Abkhaz armed forces, said that a group of Abkhaz troops patrolling the area were shelled from the Georgian side and returned fire, and no Russian troops were involved.
(AP, 11/20/08)
2008 Nov 23, In Georgia gunfire that broke out as Pres. Saakashvili and Polish Pres. Lech Kaczynski were traveling near a roadblock at the edge of Georgia-controlled territory. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said there was no gunfire from Russian or South Ossetian positions and suggested Georgia engineered the incident to discredit Russia and South Ossetia. In Tbilisi Nino Burjanadze, a former ally of Pres. Saakashvili, founded a new party: the Democratic Movement-United Georgia.
(AP, 11/24/08)(WSJ, 11/24/08, p.A8)
2008 Nov 29, Georgia said it is cutting diplomatic relations with Nicaragua after the Central American nation recognized the breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
(AP, 11/29/08)
2008 Dec 13, Russian troops retook Perevi village near the breakaway region of South Ossetia just hours after withdrawing. The move drew criticism from Georgia, the EU and US Senator John Kerry, who was on a half-day visit to Tbilisi.
(AP, 12/13/08)
2008 Dec 22, OSCE talks on the Georgia collapsed, when Russia demanded the group join Moscow in recognizing the statehood of the provinces of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The mission will expire on Dec 31.
(AP, 12/23/08)
2009 Jan 19, Russia released a text by President Dmitry Medvedev ordering the government to introduce economic sanctions against countries supplying weapons to Georgia.
(AP, 1/19/09)
2009 Jan 30, Georgia's PM Grigol Mgaloblishvili (35) resigned, citing health reasons after just three months on the job as President Mikhail Saakashvili's second-in-command.
(AP, 1/30/09)
2009 Feb 18, Georgia and Russia agreed to let monitors visit anywhere they want in Georgia and its 2 breakaway provinces.
(WSJ, 2/19/09, p.A1)
2009 Mar 23, Georgian officials released videotapes allegedly showing opposition members buying weapons with the aim of sparking violence during demonstrations against the president planned for next month.
(AP, 3/24/09)
2009 Mar 29, In Russia the film "Olympius Inferno," was first broadcast on state television. It offering the Kremlin's version of the August war with Georgia and contained anti-American overtones, reflecting Russia's anger over US support for Georgia.
(AP, 3/31/09)
2009 Apr 9, In Georgia tens of thousands of protesters thronged the streets in front of the parliament, calling on Pres. Mikhail Saakashvili to step down in the largest opposition demonstration since last year's war with Russia.
(AP, 4/9/09)
2009 Apr 10, About 20,000 demonstrators kept up the pressure on Georgia's president to resign, with some pelting his residence with cabbages and carrots on a second day of protests.
(AP, 4/10/09)
2009 Apr 22, In Georgia thousands of opposition supporters from the provinces poured into the capital to join the protests aimed at forcing President Mikhail Saakashvili to step down.
(AP, 4/22/09)
2009 Apr 30, Russia signed a deal with Georgia's two breakaway regions giving Moscow the power to guard the borders of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, a move sharply criticized in Tbilisi.
(AP, 4/30/09)
2009 May 5, Georgia said it had ended a brief mutiny at a military base near the capital that broke out after the arrest of a former special forces commander accused of planning to disrupt NATO exercises.
(AP, 5/5/09)
2009 May 6, NATO launched military exercises in former Soviet Georgia after heavy criticism from neighboring Russia and a brief mutiny in the Georgian military.
(AP, 5/6/09)
2009 May 7, In Georgia opposition protesters clashed with police in Tbilisi in the first outbreak of violence since demonstrations began in April.
(Econ, 5/9/09, p.55)
2009 May 7, The European Union extended its hand to former Soviet republics, holding a summit to draw them closer into the EU orbit despite Russia's deep misgivings. Presidents, premiers and their deputies from 33 nations signed an agreement meant to extend the EU's political and economic ties. The six ex-Soviet republics to whom the “eastern partnership" would apply are Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine.
(AP, 5/7/09)(Econ, 1/10/15, p.49)
2009 May 11, Georgia's pro-Western president and four of his fiercest opponents failed to agree on a way to resolve the country's political crisis, a negotiator said, promising continued street demonstrations to demand his resignation.
(AP, 5/11/09)
2009 May 21, In Georgia police killed Giorgy Krialashvili, a former military officer accused of plotting mutiny, and wounded two others in an overnight gunbattle. Protesters condemned the shootings and blocked Tbilisi streets in the seventh week of an anti-government campaign.
(AP, 5/21/09)
2009 Jun 15, Moscow vetoed a Western-proposed resolution to extend the mandate of UN monitors in the breakaway region of Abkhazia. It designed to buy time to negotiate a long-term plan for the 16-year-old monitoring mission in the Black Sea rebel region.
(Reuters, 6/16/09)
2009 Jul 23, US Vice President Joe Biden pledged Washington's full support for Georgia a year after its war with Russia and urged Moscow to abide by a ceasefire pact and pull its troops back from two rebel regions.
(Reuters, 7/23/09)
2009 Aug 1, Authorities in the separatist Georgian region of South Ossetia said two mortar shells were fired into the territory from Georgia proper. Georgia denied the claim and suggested it was a provocation ahead of the anniversary of last year's war with Russia.
(AP, 8/1/09)
2009 Aug 8, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev hailed the Russian victory in a war with Georgia a year ago, saying the war had redrawn the map of the Caucasus for good.
(Reuters, 8/8/09)
2009 Aug 12, Russian PM Vladimir Putin made a surprise visit to Abkhazia and said Russia will spend at least 15 billion rubles ($470 million) next year to build Russian military bases in Abkhazia and tighten the separatist Georgian region's borders.
(AP, 8/12/09)
2009 Aug 31, A Georgian court sentenced a Turkish cargo ship captain to 24 years in prison for smuggling and border violations.
(AP, 9/3/09)
2009 Sep 3, Russian’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko warned Georgia that attempts to block ships from reaching a Moscow-aligned separatist region of Georgia could end in military intervention.
(AP, 9/3/09)
2009 Sep 10, In Russia Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez recognized the pro-Russian rebel regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent states, a rare boost to the Kremlin's campaign for their international acceptance.
(Reuters 9/10/09)
2009 Sep 15, Russian news agencies said the country's coast guard warned that it will detain Georgian ships entering the territorial waters of Abkhazia. Viktor Turfanov, the head of the coastal division of the border guards service, said that Georgia this year has intercepted more than 20 ships in Abkhazian waters.
(AP, 9/15/09)
2009 Sep 30, An EU-commissioned report said Georgia's attack on its breakaway South Ossetia region marked the start of last year's war with Russia, which retaliated with excessive force.
(AP, 9/30/09)
2009 Nov 26, Georgia’s foreign minister said his country is very worried about the possible sale of French warships to Russia and intends to press the issue of security guarantees in France.
(AP, 11/26/09)
2009 Dec 12, Abkhazia held elections. Preliminary results indicated that President Sergei Bagapsh defeated four other candidates. About 70% of the 130,000 registered voters took part in the vote. The province is also home to some 40,000 ethnic Georgians who are not eligible to vote because they don't hold Abkhazian passports. An estimated 200,000 ethnic Georgians fled Abkhazia in the 1990s.
(AP, 12/13/09)
2009 Dec 15, The tiny Pacific island of Nauru recognized the rebel Black Sea region of Abkhazia, throwing its weight behind a Russian drive to win international recognition for Georgia's breakaway territories.
(Reuters, 12/15/09)
2009 Dec 19, In Georgia a woman and her 8-year-old daughter were killed when a World War II memorial was intentionally blown up in Kutaisi. The 46-meter (150-foot) concrete and bronze war memorial stood on the proposed site for a new parliament building.
(AP, 12/19/09)
2009 Dec 22, Hansjoerg Haber, EU monitoring mission chief, said Russia has failed to fully observe an EU-brokered peace deal that ended last year's war with Georgia. He said Russia has not met an obligation to withdraw its forces to positions held before the August 2008 conflict.
(AP, 12/23/09)
2009 Dec 23, Georgia's Foreign Ministry reached a deal with Russia to open a border crossing that has been closed for three years. The two sides agreed during Swiss-brokered talks that the Verkhny Lars transit point will open in March.
(AP, 12/24/09)
2010 Feb 12, The XXI Olympic Winter Games began in Vancouver, British Columbia, with the Olympics' first-ever indoor opening ceremony. Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili died in a horrific crash on a training run, casting a shadow as Vancouver opened the Winter Olympic Games with a daredevil snowboarder, an aboriginal welcome, and Wayne Gretzky lighting the cauldron.
(AP, 2/12/10)(Reuters, 2/13/10)(SFC, 2/22/10, p.A1)
2010 Feb 16, Georgia's breakaway Abkhazia region said it would allow sponsor Russia to build a military base on its soil for land troops, strengthening the region's dependence on Moscow and provoking ire from Tbilisi..
(www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE61F3JE20100216)
2010 Mar 1, Georgia and Russia reopened their only direct border crossing, more than three years after it was closed amid rising tension that erupted into war in 2008.
(AP, 3/1/10)
2010 Mar 12, Georgian church leader Metropolitan Theodor said convicts would be able to build or maintain monasteries after clerics and prosecutors struck a deal allowing criminals convicted of minor crimes to serve their sentences in the monasteries.
(AP, 3/12/10)
2010 Mar 13, In Georgia a hoax television broadcast said Russia had invaded and the president had been killed. It sparked wide anxiety in the country still traumatized by the August 2008 war in which Russian troops advanced deep into the country.
(AP, 3/15/10)
2010 May 30, Voters in Georgia chose local leaders in the first ballot since President Mikhail Saakashvili led the country into a disastrous war with neighboring Russia nearly two years ago. Candidates from President Saakashvili's party dominated local elections, according to preliminary results.
(AP, 5/30/10)(AP, 5/31/10)
2010 Jun 25, Georgian police cordoned off the central square in Gori and at night toppled the a statue of former Russian dictator George Stalin.
(Econ, 8/21/10, p.41)
2010 Jun 27, Authorities in Georgia tore down another monument to Soviet dictator and native son Josef Stalin.
(AP, 6/27/10)
2010 Jun 27, It was reported that Vienna residents have become victims of burglary in recent weeks. The Austrian interior ministry suspected that many of the burglers were from the Republic of Georgia and were supported by the Georgian Mafia. The alleged local head, a restaurant owner in Vienna, has been arrested. Police suspected the burglaries were part of plan to finance a coup against Geeorgian Pres. Saakashvili.
(SSFC, 6/27/10, p.A4)
2010 Jul 5, In Tbilisi, Georgia, US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton pledged US support for the former Soviet state.
(AP, 7/5/10)
2010 Jul 19, In Russia the Khamovniki District Court in Moscow said in a statement it has convicted Tariel Oniani (58) on extortion and abduction charges. The native of Georgia had been convicted seven times and is wanted in Spain since 2005 on money laundering charges.
(AP, 7/20/10)
2010 Aug 11, Russia said it has deployed high-precision air defense missiles in the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia, sending a defiant signal to Tblisi and the West two years after a war with Georgia.
(Reuters, 8/11/10)
2010 Nov 5, Georgia's government announced the arrests of 13 people, including four Russian citizens, who are accused of spying for Russia's armed forces. The arrests, which took place in October, were announced on the day Russia's military intelligence agency celebrates its professional holiday, Day of the Military Intelligence Officer.
(AP, 11/5/10)
2010 Dec 7, Georgia said it has arrested six people, all of them Georgian citizens, suspected of being agents for Russia and accused them of staging a series of explosions, including one outside the US Embassy in the capital.
(AP, 12/7/10)
2010 Ronald Asmus authored “A Little War That Shook the World: Georgia, Russia and the Future of the West." It covered the 2008 war in Georgia.
(Econ, 1/23/10, p.78)
2010 Thomas de Waal authored “The Caucasus: An Introduction."
(Econ, 10/23/10, p.102)
2011 Apr 1, The United Nations' highest court threw out Georgia's complaint accusing Russia and separatist militias of years of ethnic cleansing in two breakaway Georgian provinces. The court said it had no jurisdiction in the case because Russia and Georgia had never attempted to negotiate a settlement to the dispute before Georgia brought it to the court.
(AP, 4/1/11)
2011 May 25, In Georgia some 3,000 anti-government protesters demanded the resignation of Pres. Saakashvili and said they will try to block a May 26 military parade in the capital.
(AP, 5/25/11)
2011 May 26, Georgian officials went ahead with an Independence Day military parade along the central avenue where two people were killed and almost 40 injured in the violent breakup of an anti-government protest hours earlier.
(AP, 5/26/11)
2011 Jul 6, A Georgian court in the Black Sea port of Batumi convicted a Russian citizen and eight Georgians of espionage and gave them prison sentences ranging from 11 to 14 years.
(AP, 7/7/11)
2011 Jul 7, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili's personal photographer was arrested on suspicion of espionage, along with his wife and two other photographers.
(AP, 7/7/11)
2011 Jul 9, In Georgia Irakli Gedenidze, Zurab Kurtsikidze and another photographer were charged with espionage. Natia Gedenidze was released without charge. Gedenidze, the personal photographer to the Georgian president, confessed to giving another photographer, Zurab Kurtsikidze, details of the president's itinerary, motorcade route and offices for unspecified remuneration.
(AP, 7/9/11)
2011 Nov 13, Voters in Georgia's breakaway republic of South Ossetia chose a new president for the first time since Georgia and Russia fought a brief war over control of the territory in 2008. South Ossetia has been led since 2001 by Eduard Kokoiti, who has served two terms as president and is now stepping down. Among those favored to succeed him is Anatoly Bibilov, who heads South Ossetia's emergencies services and has the support of Russia's dominant pro-Kremlin party. Anatoly Bibilov and former education minister Alla Dzhioyeva each won about 25 percent of the vote forcing a runoff in two weeks.
(AP, 11/13/11)(AP, 11/14/11)
2011 Dec 31, Georgia’s defense ministry said a Georgian soldier has been killed in Afghanistan, the 11th from the ex-Soviet state to die serving alongside NATO-led forces fighting the Taliban.
(AFP, 12/31/11)
2012 Feb 13, In India and Georgia assailants targeted Israeli diplomats in near-simultaneous strikes that Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu blamed on archenemy Iran, and its Lebanese proxy, Hezbollah. The attacks wounded four people. A hitman on a rented motorbike attached a magnetic bomb to the back of an Israeli embassy car carrying the 42-year-old diplomat as she went to pick up her children from school in New Delhi. The woman, also the wife of the defense attache at the embassy, was left in a critical condition with spinal injuries and was flown to Israel for further treatment. 3 men of Iranian origin were later identified as suspects.
(AP, 2/13/12)(AFP, 3/15/12)
2012 May 26, Georgia’s Pres. Mikhail Saakashvili inaugurated the country’s new Parliament building in Kutaisi.
(SSFC, 5/27/12, p.A6)
2012 May 27, In Georgia tens of thousands of people thronged the streets of Tbilisi to show their opposition to President Mikhail Saakashvili, in the largest anti-government demonstration in three years. It was organized by Bidzina Ivanishvili, a billionaire businessman who is Georgia's richest man and leading philanthropist.
(AP, 5/27/12)
2012 Jun 30, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili named veteran Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili as the new prime minister ahead of an October parliamentary election. Under constitutional changes approved in 2010, the prime minister will gain additional powers to rival those of the president.
(AP, 7/1/12)
2012 Aug 29, At least 3 Georgian commandos and 11 militants from Dagestan were killed during an operation to free hostages held along Georgia's border with Russia.
(AP, 8/29/12)
2012 Sep 20, In Georgia street protests against the brutal abuse of prisoners escalated in Tbilisi, fueling anger against the Western-allied government and possibly boosting support for the opposition before a tight parliamentary election.
(AP, 9/20/12)
2012 Sep 29, In Georgia an estimated 100,000 opposition supporters rallied in the capital in a show of strength days before a parliamentary election that presents the toughest challenge to the future of President Mikhail Saakashvili's government since he took office in 2004.
(AP, 9/29/12)
2012 Oct 1, Georgia held parliamentary elections. The Georgian Dream party led by billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili edged out the United National Movement of Pres. Saakashvili.
(AP, 10/1/12)(SFC, 10/2/12, p.A3)
2012 Oct 2, Georgia’s President Mikhail Saakashvili, a staunch ally of the West, acknowledged defeat in parliamentary elections and called on Bidzina Ivanishvili to form a new government. That puts the tycoon on track to be prime minister, which will be Georgia's most powerful job under constructional changes next year.
(AP, 10/2/12)
2012 Nov 22, Georgia's new PM Bidzina Ivanishvili said he would move quickly to expand the Cabinet's powers, a change that would take away even more influence from the ex-Soviet nation's beleaguered pro-Western president.
(AP, 11/22/12)
2012 Dec 18, In Afghanistan a coalition soldier went missing. Afghan police found the body and turned it over to NATO forces on Dec 29. He was one of 1,560 troops serving from the former Soviet republic of Georgia. 18 Georgian soldiers have been killed since the country joined the international military operations in Afghanistan in August 2009.
(AP, 12/21/12)(AP, 12/30/12)
2012 Donald Rayfield authored “Edge of Empires: A History of Georgia."
(Econ, 11/24/12, p.87)
2013 Jan 10, Georgia opposition groups and NGOs announced that more than 1 million of Georgia's 4.6 million citizens have signed a petition calling for the resignation of Pres. Mikhail Saakashvili.
(AP, 1/20/13)
2013 Jan 13, In Georgia 190 people considered political prisoners by the new parliament walked free under an amnesty strongly opposed by Pres. Mikhail Saakashvili. More than 3,000 other prisoners who had their sentences reduced under the amnesty will be freed in the next two months.
(AP, 1/13/13)
2013 Jan 20, In Georgia more than 1,000 people protested outside of the president's residence in Tbilisi to demand that he immediately resign and hand over executive power to the speaker of parliament.
(AP, 1/20/13)
2013 Apr 19, In Georgia some 10,000 supporters of embattled pro-Western President Mikhail Saakashvili gathered for a rally testing their strength ahead of October's presidential vote.
(AP, 4/19/13)
2013 Jun 6, The Afghan governor of Kunar province alleged that an overnight NATO airstrike killed 3 civilians and wounded seven there, a claim the US-led coalition flatly denied. A civilian was killed when a bomb exploded inside a restaurant in the northern city of Sari Pul. Another 13 people were wounded. In western Farah province insurgents gunned down two tribal elders as they drove into the provincial capital. A suicide attacker drove a truck into the entrance of a camp in Helmand province in Now-e-Zad district and detonated it. 7 Georgian soldiers were killed.
(AP, 6/6/13)(AP, 6/7/13)
2013 Jun 12, Georgia said that it has closed two of its bases in Afghanistan after 10 of its soldiers were killed by militant attacks within the last four weeks. It will not reduce the number of troops serving there.
(AP, 6/12/13)
2013 Jul 3, In Georgia a Turk and a Moldovan were detained after crossing the border from Armenia in a truck with tens of millions of dollars worth of heroin hidden in a secret compartment.
(Reuters, 7/5/13)
2013 Jul 30, Georgia's culture ministry said it will restore a towering monument to Soviet dictator and native son Josef Stalin that was taken down three years ago. The restoration is part of a rollback of Pres. Saakashvili's legacy after his party lost a parliamentary vote last fall to a coalition headed by a Russia-friendly billionaire.
(AP, 7/30/13)
2013 Oct 14, French authorities detained Davit Kezerashvili, a former Georgian defence minister, wanted in his homeland on corruption charges. Kezerashvili, who also headed the financial police, was charged in January with taking a bribe of $12 million (nine million euros) to facilitate alcohol smuggling in the ex-Soviet nation.
(AFP, 10/15/13)
2013 Oct 27, Georgia voted for a new president in an election that will bring the curtain down on Mikheil Saakashvili's decade-long rule but is unlikely to end political uncertainty in the former Soviet republic. Former university rector Giorgi Margvelashvili won 62% of the vote.
(Reuters, 10/27/13)(AP, 10/28/13)
2013 Oct 28, A Georgian court convicted former defense minister Bacho Akhalaia and ordered him sent to prison, in another blow for outgoing President Mikhail Saakashvili the day after a presidential election that was won by his rival.
(AP, 10/28/13)
2013 Nov 2, Georgia's PM Bidzina Ivanishvili named Interior Minister Irakly Garibashvili (31) as his successor. Under changes to the constitution that will this month transfer many of the president's responsibilities to the prime minister, Garibashvili will become the country's most powerful politician.
(Reuters, 11/2/13)
2013 Nov 17, Georgia inaugurated philosopher and former university rector Giorgi Margvelashvili (44) as the new president. He pledged to strengthen ties with the West and maintain its commitment to NATO.
(AP, 11/17/13)
2013 Nov 29, Georgia and Moldova signed important agreements on political cooperation, reform and free trade with the EU at the summit of EU leaders in Vilnius.
(http://tinyurl.com/nq8ouy4)(Econ, 11/23/13, p.56)
2013 Dec 21, The mayor of Georgia's capital Tbilisi was suspended from office after he was charged with misspending public funds in a case he and his opposition colleagues said was a witch-hunt against supporters of former president Mikheil Saakashvili.
(Reuters, 12/22/13)
2014 Feb 17, In Georgia Vano Merabishvili, a top ally of former President Mikhail Saakashvili, was convicted of embezzlement and abuse of office and sentenced to five years in prison.
(AP, 2/17/14)
2014 May 12, A European human rights monitor urged Georgia to improve its justice system, promote tolerance and avoid the selective prosecution of officials who served former president Mikheil Saakashvili.
(Reuters, 5/12/14)
2014 Jun 27, European Union leaders signed broad trade and economic deals with non-member countries Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia.
(AP, 6/27/14)
2014 Jul 7, Eduard Shevardnadze (b.1928), a former president of Georgia and Soviet foreign minister, died in Georgia after a long struggle with illness.
(Reuters, 7/7/14)(SFC, 7/8/14, p.C4)
2014 Jul 15, In Georgia Erosi Kitsmarishvili, the founder of the Rustavi 2 TV channel, was found dead in his car with a bullet in his head.
(AP, 7/16/14)
2014 Jul 25, Georgia's interior minister said that $400 million of heroin seized earlier this month, in the country's biggest ever drugs haul, belonged to the Taliban and was headed for Europe.
(Reuters, 7/25/14)
2014 Sep 7, The United States and Georgia moved to expand their defense relationship, including the possible sale of US Black Hawk helicopters to the former Soviet bloc nation.
(AP, 9/7/14)
2014 Nov 4, Georgia’s PM Irakli Garibashvili, a Georgian Dream party member, fired defense minister Irakli Alasania, a Free Democrats member, amid an investigation into corruption in the military. European Integration Minister Aleksi Petriashvili resigned in protest. A day later Foreign Minister Maya Panjikidze and three of her deputies followed suit.
(AP, 11/5/14)
2014 Nov 13, Kakha Bendukidze (58), the author of liberal reforms that overhauled Georgia's post-Soviet economy, died in London where he was recovering from heart surgery. In May he was appointed adviser to Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko who is pushing for liberal reforms. Bendukidze had retired from public service in 2009 to invest in education and found the Free University in Tbilisi which went on to become the country's leading institution.
(AP, 11/14/14)
2014 Nov 15, In Georgia tens of thousands of people rallied in the capital to protest a planned agreement between Russia and Georgia's separatist province of Abkhazia. A proposed agreement envisages the creation of joint Russian and Abkhazian military forces.
(AP, 11/15/14)
2014 Nov 24, Russia further tightened its control over Georgia's breakaway province of Abkhazia with a new treaty envisaging closer military and economic ties, a move that has drawn outrage in Georgia.
(AP, 11/24/14)
2015 Feb 19, Georgia condemned the signing of a border agreement between its breakaway region of South Ossetia and Russia, accusing Moscow of moving closer to annexing a territory it supported in a five-day conflict in 2008.
(Reuters, 2/19/15)
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The capital of Georgia is Tbilisi.
1.8Mil BC Hominid fossils and crude stone tools of this time were found in the former Soviet republic of Georgia in 1991 beneath the ruins of a medieval castle at Dmanisi. The tools were similar to ones in China dating at 1.66 million. A 3rd smaller skull was found in 2002. All 3 were tentatively classified as Homo erectus. One skull of a man indicated that he had been almost toothless for at least 2 years before death. In 2013 a study of the findings was published in Science.
(Arch, 9/02, p.10)(SFC, 5/12/00, p.A5)(SFC, 7/5/02, p.A5)(SFC, 4/7/05, p.A3)(SFC, 10/18/12, p.A4)
33000BC Ivory carving dating to about this time depicted a busty woman. It was found in 2008 in a German cave and was unveiled in 2009 by archaeologists who believed it to be the oldest known sculpture of the human form. The carving found in six fragments in Germany's Hohle Fels cave depicts a woman with a swollen belly, wide-set thighs and large, protruding breasts.
(AP, 5/14/09)
8000BC Wine was produced in the region known as Colchis (later Georgia) as early as this time.
(Econ, 11/15/08, p.100)
500-600 The monastic complex of David Gareja was founded in the 6th century by David (St. David Garejeli), one of the thirteen Assyrian monks who arrived in Georgia at the same time. His disciples Dodo and Luciane expanded the original lavra and founded two other monasteries known as Dodo's Rka (literally, "the horn of Dodo") and Natlismtsemeli ("the Baptist"). Part of the complex is also located in the Agstafa rayon of Azerbaijan and thus became subject to a border dispute between Georgian and Azerbaijani authorities.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Gareja_monastery_complex)
632-661 The Rashidun Caliphate, also known as the Rightly Guided Caliphate, comprising the first four caliphs in Islam's history, was founded after Muhammad's death. At its height, the Caliphate extended from the Arabian Peninsula, to the Levant, Caucasus and North Africa in the west, to the Iranian highlands and Central Asia in the east. It was the one of the largest empires in history up until that time.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rashidun_Caliphate)
683-685 Khazars invaded Transcaucasia and inflicted much damage and stole much booty. The Khazar invaders killed the rulers of Armenia and Georgia.
(TJOK, p.159)
1014 May 7, Bagrat III (b~960) of the Georgian Bagrationi dynasty, died. He was King of the Abkhazians from 978 on (as Bagrat II) and King of Kings of the Georgians from 1008 on. He is known to have constructed a magnificent cathedral, the Bagrati Cathedral, at Kutaisi, western Georgia. Its ruins named a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1994.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bagrat_III_of_Georgia)(http://whc.unesco.org/en/list/710)
1089-1125 David the Builder, a king who increased Georgia's wealth and prestige after, at age 16, taking the reins of a country beset by attackers.
(AP, 1/25/04)(Internet)
1172-1216 Shota Rustaveli, a Georgian poet, lived about this time. He is considered by many to be one of the greatest representatives of the literature of the medieval world. His literary work included “The Knight in the Panther's Skin" ("Vepkhistkaosani" in Georgian), the Georgian national epic poem.
(http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9064497)
1178 The wise King Giorgi III of Georgia had his daughter, Tamara (19), crowned as his co-ruler to provide an orderly succession.
(www.undelete.org/woa/woa01-18.html)
1204-1205 Georgia’s Queen Tamara marched with her men to the rousing victory over the Turks at the Battle of Basiani where she is hailed with the cry, "Our King Tamara."
(www.undelete.org/woa/woa01-18.html)
1212 Jan 18, Queen Tamara of Georgia in Transcaucasia died after a 24-year reign during which her soldiers proclaim her "our King."
(www.undelete.org/woa/woa01-18.html)
1236 Queen Rusudani (41), the daughter of Queen Tamara, fled Georgia as the unstoppable Mongol hordes ravished the area. She had been proclaimed "King" at the death of her brother.
(www.undelete.org/woa/woa01-18.html)
1258 Feb 10, Huegu (Hulega Khan), a Mongol leader and grandson of Genghis Khan, seized Baghdad following a 4-day assault. Mongol invaders from Central Asia took over Baghdad and ended the Abbasid-Seljuk Empire. They included Uzbeks, Kazaks, Georgians and other groups. Some 200 to 800 thousand people were killed and looting lasted 17 days.
(ATC, p.91)(AP, 2/10/99)(SFC, 4/12/03, p.A1)
1265 Mongols sacked the monastic complex of David Gareja in Georgia.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Gareja_monastery_complex) (Econ, 8/28/10, p.50)
1395 Tamerlane, a Turkic conqueror, swept into Southern Russia and Georgia driving locals into the hills.
(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A12)
1615 The Persians sacked the monastic complex of David Gareja in Georgia.
(Econ, 8/28/10, p.50)
1722 Peter the Great exploited the chaos in the Persian Empire to lead an expedition into Transcaucasia, he struck an alliance with Vakhtang VI, the Georgian ruler of Kartli.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_within_the_Russian_Empire)
1769-1772 A handful of Russian troops of General Totleben battled against Turkish invaders in Imereti and Kartl-Kakheti.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_within_the_Russian_Empire)
1783 Jul 24, Georgia became a protectorate of tsarist Russia.
(MC, 7/24/02)
1798 Jan 11, Erekle II (b.~1720), Georgian monarch of the Bagrationi Dynasty, died. He had reigned as the king of Kakheti from 1744 to 1762, and of Kartli and Kakheti from 1762 until 1798. His name is frequently transliterated from the Latinized form Heraclius.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_within_the_Russian_Empire)
1801 South Ossetia was absorbed into the Russian Empire along with Georgia.
(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A12)
1876 May, Residents in Tbilisi, Georgia, found a collection of ancient gold jewels in the muddy streets following a downpour. The objects were dated from the 5th to the 1st century BC when the region was known as Colchis.
(Econ, 11/15/08, p.100)
1890 The Marxist Armenian Revolutionary Federation, called the Dashnaks, was founded in the Russian Empire, in Tiflis (Georgia).
(http://homepages.cae.wisc.edu/~dwilson/Armenia/justin.html)
1905 Mar 8, The peasant revolt in Russia was reported to be spreading to Georgia.
(HN, 3/8/98)
1906 Apr 10, A report from Russia said 7 soldiers were killed during a rebellion at the garrison in Tiflis (Tbilisi, Georgia). On April 17 it was reported that 315 soldiers were killed in a fight between mutineers and loyal troops.
(SFC, 4/18/06, p.A15)
1907 Stalin (1879-1953) organized an armed robbery on 2 coaches carrying treasure to the state bank in central Tbilisi, Georgia. He delivered his gains to Lenin. In 2007 Simon Sebag Montefiore authored “Young Stalin."
(Econ, 5/19/07, p.88)
1918 South Ossetians made a bid to break away from Georgia and thousands fled in the ensuing violence. Menshevik Georgia waged a brutal war to absorb Abkhazia and South Ossetia. In 1921 the Red Army regained control and absorbed all three into the Soviet Union.
(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A12)(Econ, 10/23/10, p.102)
1921 Feb 12, Soviet troops invaded neighboring Georgia.
(MC, 2/12/02)
1922 South Ossetia became an autonomous region within the Soviet Republic of Georgia.
(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A12)
1928 Jan 25, Eduard Shevardnadze, foreign minister of USSR, was born in Soviet Georgia.
(MC, 1/25/02)
1931 USSR leader Joseph Stalin turned Abkhazia into an autonomous region of Georgia. Beria, his secret police chief, later resettled Georgians from the western part of the country in Abkhazia.
(Econ, 7/5/08, p.64)
1936 Dec 5, Armenian SSR, Azerbaijan SSR, Georgian SSR, Kazakh SSR & Kirghiz SSR became constituent republics of Soviet Union.
(MC, 12/5/01)
1986 The Georgian film “Repentance" was directed by Tengiz Abuladze. It was an allegory about a small town mayor who gradually becomes a despot. The film was about the crimes of Stalinism and was banned by censors.
(SFC, 9/23/98, p.A10)(Econ, 7/12/14, p.82)
1987 Sep 13, Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze arrived in Washington for talks aimed at a possible superpower summit; Shevardnadze carried with him a letter from Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev to President Reagan.
(AP, 9/13/97)
1988 Jan 6, Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze was quoted by the Afghan news agency as saying the Kremlin wanted to pull an estimated 115,000 soldiers from Afghanistan in the coming year.
(AP, 1/6/98)
1989 Apr, Troops of Russian General Igor Rodionov killed 29 demonstrators in Tbilisi. Troops under Russian Gen’l Lebed killed 18 protestors, including 16 women and children, in Tbilisi, Georgia. Colonel Gen’l. Igor Rodionov ordered the troops to break up anti-Kremlin protests in Tbilisi.
(WSJ, 6/18/96, p.A12)(SFC, 6/26/96, p.A11)(http: ICL)
1989-1982 South Ossetia defended itself from Georgia with aid from Russia and about 1,000 people died in the fighting. Some 25-40,000 people fled the area.
(SFC, 9/1/98, p.A10)
1990 Aug, South Ossetia, a region of north central Georgia with a population of about 100,000, declared itself sovereign. Ethnic Ossetians speak a language similar to Persian. Georgia abolished South Ossetia’s autonomous status following the attempted break. Georgian leader Zviad Gamsakhurdia declared South Ossetia part of Georgia and marched on Tskhinvali, the declared capital.
(SFC, 9/1/98, p.A10)(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A12)
1990 Dec 20, Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze shocked Soviet lawmakers by announcing his resignation, warning that "dictatorship is coming."
(AP, 12/20/00)
1991 Apr 9, Georgia SSR declared independence from the USSR.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georgia_(country))
1991 Apr 29, More than 100 people were killed and some 100,000 were left homeless when a strong earthquake struck Soviet Georgia.
(AP, 4/29/01)
1991 Jun, Georgian leader Zviad Gamsakhurdia, a noted author and scholar of the iconic Georgian poet Shota Rustaveli, was elected president of Georgia.
(AP, 3/28/07)
1991 Sex selective abortions began increasing in the Caucasus region as ultrasound equipment became available from the West. By 2013 over 115 boys were born in Armenia and Azerbaijan for every 100 girls. In Georgia the ration was 120 to 100.
(Econ, 9/21/13, p.54)
1992 Jan 6, After two weeks of fighting, ousted Georgian President Zviad Gamsakhurdia fled the capital, Tbilisi.
(AP, 1/6/02)
1992 Jul, Russia brokered a cease fire between South Ossetia and Georgia.
(SFC, 9/1/98, p.A10)(WSJ, 8/27/08, p.A12)
1992 In Georgia Eduard Shevardnadze, former Soviet foreign minister, was elected speaker of Parliament and the became the country's leader.
(WSJ, 11/6/95, p.A-1)(SFC, 11/24/03, p.A11)
1992 In Tbilisi, Georgia, the central-heating system went out of service. Carbon-monoxide poisonings began as residents turned to wood and gas stoves.
(AP, 2/5/05)
1992-1993 Separatists in the northwestern province of Abkhazia took over control by war. War between Abkhaz forces and Georgians killed 10,000 and left the Black Sea region as a de facto independent but unrecognized state. In the siege of Sukhumi Abkhaz rebels encircled the capital of the region.
(SFC, 2/21/98, p.A10)(SFC, 5/26/98, p.A8)(WSJ, 11/18/06, p.P11)
1993 Mar 19, Georgia shot down a Russian warplane over the separatist Abkhazia region, killing its pilot and heightening tensions.
(AP, 3/19/03)
1993 Aug 8, Freddie Woodruff (b.1947), CIA agent chief in Tbilisi, Georgia, was shot and killed during an outing with friends. Georgian authorities charged Anzor Sharmaidze (20), a volunteer soldier, with the murder. Sharmaidze confessed under torture and later said he was framed for the murder. In 2008 Sharmaidze was granted parole from prison.
(http://public.cq.com/docs/hs/hsnews110-000002604568.html)(WSJ, 10/18/08, p.A1)(WSJ, 10/27/08, p.a12)
1993 Sep 22, An aircraft operated by Transair Georgia was shot down by Abkhazian separatist forces. It crashed onto the runway and caught fire, killing 108.
(AP, 6/11/13)
1993 Dec 3, Georgia became a member of Russia's Commonwealth of Independent States; Russia, in return, backed Shevardnadze against Abkhaz rebels.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commonwealth_of_Independent_States)
1993 Dec 31, Former Georgian President Zviad Gamsakhurdia (b.1939) died on New Year’s Eve. He had returned to lead an uprising in western Georgia, but the fighting was quickly put down and Gamsakhurdia was surrounded. His body was then taken to Chechnya. In 2007 His body was returned for burial in Georgia.
(AP, 3/28/07)
1994 Nov, Abkhazia declared independence from Georgia and set up its own government. No other country gave recognition. Residents of the area numbered about 200,000 and spoke their own language. Vladislav Ardzinba became president.
(SSFC, 9/24/06, p.A20)(http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/3261059.stm)
1994 Georgia reached a cease-fire with Abkhazia.
(SFC, 11/24/03, p.A11)
1995 Aug 29, In Tbilisi, Georgia, the motorcade of Eduard Shevardnadze was attacked as he left for the ceremonial signing of the new constitution.
(SFC, 2/10/98, p.A12)
1995 Eduard Shevardnadze was elected president of Georgia for a 5-year term after the country adopted a new constitution.
(SFC, 11/24/03, p.A11)
1996 Apr, Shevardnadze signed a cooperation agreement with Azerbaijan and Armenia.
(http: ICL)
1996 Jul 19, Peacekeeping mandate of Russia in the Abkhaz conflict was due to expire.
(http: ICL)
1996 Jul, After having secured a new resolution of support from the United Nations Security Council, Shevardnadze started talks to Abkhaz leader Vladislav Ardzinba.
(http: ICL)
1997 Jan 9, The government informed the US that diplomat Georgui Makharadze would be recalled following his involvement in a car crash that left a 16-year-old Washington girl dead. Police evidence strongly suggested that he had been drinking.
(SFC, 1/10/96, p.A2)
1997 Oct 8, Gueorgui Makharadze, a diplomat from the Republic of Georgia, pleaded guilty in Washington to charges stemming from a car crash that killed Maryland teen-ager Jovianne Waltrick. Makharadze was sentenced to seven years in prison; he initially served his term in a US prison, but was later transferred to Georgia, where he was paroled in 2002.
(AP, 10/8/07)
1997 Former Soviet republics (Georgia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan and Moldova) formed Guuam to seek cooperation outside Russian influence.
(WSJ, 3/4/05, p.A13)
1997 Rocket-propelled grenades slammed the armor-plated Mercedes of Pres. Shevardnadze and 2 bodyguards were killed.
(SFC, 8/31/98, p.A8)
1998 Feb 9, In Tbilisi armed attackers ambushed Pres. Shevardnadze (70). One attacker and one bodyguard were killed.
(SFC, 2/10/98, p.A12)
1998 Feb 19, Gunmen kidnapped 4 UN observers and 6 civilians and demanded the release of 7 suspects held for last week’s assassination attempt on Pres. Shevardnadze.
(WSJ, 2/20/98, p.A1)
1998 Feb 25, The UN prisoners were freed and the leader of the kidnapping group escaped.
(WSJ, 2/26/98, p.A1)
1998 Apr 21, It was reported that the US and Britain have begun a secretive removal of nuclear materials near Tbilisi. Britain volunteered to accept the material.
(SFC, 4/21/98, p.A18)
1998 May 25, Fighting between Abkhaz forces and Georgian irregulars raged inside a Russian patrolled buffer zone despite an agreed 1993 cease-fire. Georgia later claimed that 100 people died and that 38,000 Georgians were driven from their homes.
(SFC, 5/26/98, p.A8)(WSJ, 5/26/98, p.A1)(WSJ, 5/28/98, p.A1)
1998 Oct 19, In Georgia an army mutiny failed after 200 troops opposed to Pres. Shevardnadze surrendered. 4 rebels and one government soldier were killed.
(WSJ, 10/20/98, p.A1)
1998 Oct 29, Five nations endorsed the oil pipeline from the Caspian to the Mediterranean Sea. Turkey, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakstan and Uzbekistan committed to the 1,080 mile conduit with a push from the US.
(SFC, 10/30/98, p.A14)
1998 Dec 24, In Tbilisi, Georgia, gunmen killed Greek diplomat Anastasius Mizitrasos.
(SFC, 12/25/98, p.A19)
1999 Oct 13, In Georgia gunmen seized 6 UN observers and a translator as they delivered aid to Abkhazia. 4 of the observers were released the next day and the ransom was raised to $350,000. The last of the hostages were released 2 days later.
(SFC, 10/14/99, p.A14)(SFC, 10/15/99, p.D3)(SFC, 10/16/99, p.A16)
1999 Nov 8, Pope John Paul II stopped to "build new bridges" with the Orthodox Church and Patriarch Ilia II. Separately Prime Minister Shevardnadze's party won the recent parliamentary elections.
(SFC, 11/9/99, p.A14)(WSJ, 11/9/99, p.A1)
1999 Nov 17, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey agreed to a US-backed plan for a Caspian oil pipeline from Baku to Ceyhan to be completed in 2004. The 1st shipment was made in 2006.
(SFC, 11/18/99, p.C6)(AFP, 6/4/06)
1999 Nov 23, An agreement between Georgia and Russia was announced to cut the number of Russian forces over the next few years.
(SFC, 11/24/99, p.C5)
2000 Apr 9, In Georgia Pres. Eduard Shevardnadze won re-election with some 82% of the vote. Dzhumber Patiashvili, ex-Communist leader, trailed with 17% and charged that there was widespread vote rigging.
(SFC, 4/10/00, p.A16)
2000 Jun 1, Abkhaz officials reported that 5 members of a UN observer mission were missing.
(SFC, 6/3/00, p.A12)
2000 Aug 4, In Georgia three Red Cross workers were believed to have been kidnapped. Their car was found the next day near the border with Chechnya.
(SFC, 8/7/00, p.C16)(WSJ, 8/7/00, p.A1)
2001 May 25, In Georgia some 400 National Guard mutinied over improved living conditions at a base 25 miles northeast of Tbilisi.
(SFC, 5/26/01, p.A10)
2001 Oct 8, In the Abkhazia region of Georgia a UN helicopter was shot down and 9 people were killed.
(SFC, 10/9/01, p.B4)
2001 Oct 9, Abkhazia accused Chechen and Georgian fighters of killing 14 villagers and mounting a helicopter raid.
(WSJ, 10/10/01, p.A1)
2001 Oct 30, In Tbilisi the state security ministry sent 30 agents to the independent Rustavi 2 TV station, ostensibly for a tax investigation. The director refused the examination of financial files and put the standoff on the air which prompted 5-10 thousand people to gather in protest. Security Minister Vakhtang Kutateladze was later fired by Pres. Shevardnadze.
(SFC, 11/2/01, p.D2)
2001 Nov 1, In Georgia Pres. Shevardnadze fired his government as demonstrators took to the streets and demanded changes.
(SFC, 11/2/01, p.D2)
2001 Dec, Abandoned Soviet nuclear batteries were found by woodsmen in the mountains of Abkhazia near Dzhvari filled with strontium 90. Experts removed the devices Feb 5.
(SFC, 2/1/02, p.A14)(SFC, 2/5/02, p.A6)
2001 An expedition to the Krubera cave in Voronja, Georgia, measured its depth at 5,610 feet, making it the world's deepest known cave.
(NG, Feb, 04)
2002 Feb 26, It was reported that the US has begun providing the former Soviet Republic of Georgia with military aid to counter terrorist threats in the Pankisi Gorge region. Some 100-200 US soldiers were included in the $64 million program to begin in mid-March.
(SFC, 2/27/02, p.A8)(SFC, 3/2/02, p.A11)
2002 Mar 21, It was reported that Georgian fighters expected to use their US training against secessionists in Abkhazia, which was unofficially protected by Russia.
(SFC, 3/21/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr 12, Russia sent troops into the Kodori gorge of Georgia to watch the Abkhazia border. The move was condemned by Georgian officials and troops were soon withdrawn.
(SFC, 4/13/02, p.A11)(WSJ, 4/15/02, p.A1)
2002 Apr 25, An earthquake in Tbilisi, Georgia, killed at least 3 people.
(SFC, 4/26/02, p.A15)
2002 Apr 29, The 1st 20 of some 2000 US soldiers landed in the former Soviet republic of Georgia.
(SFC, 4/30/02, p.A14)
2002 May 19, A team of 50 US Green Berets landed in Tbilisi for a 2-year training program for Georgia’s army.
(SFC, 5/20/02, p.A14)
2002 May, Pres. Shevardnadze of Georgia issued a decree ordering new measures to insure the rights of worshippers. He denounced the last 3 years of violence against new religions including Jehovah’s Witnesses. Only the Orthodox Church had special status and tax exemption.
(SFC, 8/17/02, p.A8)
2002 Aug 23, Pres. Shevardnadze accused Russia of bombing inside Georgia’s border. One person was reported killed.
(SFC, 8/24/02, p.A7)
2002 Sep 11, In Russia Pres. Putin threatened military strikes on Georgia to defend itself from terrorist attacks.
(SFC, 9/12/02, p.A7)
2002 Sep 23, Georgia's president sought to defuse an explosive war of words with Russia, offering to let Moscow send unarmed military observers to the mountain valley where Russia says terrorists are operating.
(AP, 9/23/02)
2002 Oct 22, It was reported that special forces in the Pankisi Gorge of Georgia had captured 15 Arab militants linked to al Qaeda.
(SFC, 10/22/02, p.A7)
2002 Nov 3, Dzhumber Lezhava returned to Tbilisi, Georgia, ending a nine-year trip around the world by bicycle.
(AP, 11/3/02)
2002 Russia changed its citizenship law to allow massive distribution of passports to people in the Abkhazia and South Ossetia regions of Georgia.
(Econ, 10/3/09, p.65)
2003 Mar 24, In Georgia Pres. Shevardnadze confirmed that the US was flying U-2 spy planes over the Pankisi Gorge area to help fight Chechen rebel infiltration.
(WSJ, 3/25/03, p.A1)
2003 Aug 18, All of Georgia was without power for the entire day, and officials in the impoverished former Soviet republic were struggling to determine the cause of the blackout.
(AP, 8/19/03)
2003 Sep 19, The government of Georgia scrapped an accord guaranteeing religious freedom for Catholics. The next day the Vatican issued an unusually strong rebuke to the former Soviet republic and its dominant Orthodox Church.
(AP, 9/20/03)
2003 Nov 2, Georgia held parliamentary elections and opinion polls said the opposition would take control unless there was massive fraud. Parliamentary candidates allied with Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze held a slim lead in elections that European monitors said were marred by irregularities.
(SFC, 11/3/03, p.A3)(AP, 11/4/03)
2003 Nov 5, In Georgia opposition parties protested for a 2nd day, accusing President Eduard Shevardnadze's government of rigging the results of parliamentary elections.
(AP, 11/5/03)
2003 Nov 22, Opposition supporters broke into Georgia's Parliament and took it over, scuffling with lawmakers and forcing President Eduard Shevardnadze to flee as thousands of protesters outside demanded his resignation.
(AP, 11/22/03)
2003 Nov 23, Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze signed his resignation papers as leaders of protesters already occupying parliament urged tens of thousands of supporters to seize more organs of state power and some military units defected to the jubilant protesters thronging the capital's streets. Nino Burdzhanadze, leader of the United Democrats opposition, declared herself acting president and announced a new election within 45 days.
(AP, 11/23/03)(SSFC, 11/23/03, p.A3)
2003 Nov 25, Georgian lawmakers set a new presidential election for Jan 4. The foreign debt stood at $1.8 billion, the unemployment rate was 30% and the average monthly salary was $20.
(AP, 11/25/03)(SFC, 11/26/03, p.A13)
2003 Nov 26, In Georgia Mikhail Saakashvili (35), a US educated lawyer, said he would run for president as the sole candidate of the opposition National Movement party. His campaign later became known as the “rose revolution."
(SFC, 11/27/03, p.A9)(Econ, 11/17/07, p.16)
2003 Dec 10, Aslan Abashidze (65), a former Soviet bureaucrat who has ruled the region of Adzharia since Georgia's 1991 independence, refused to accept Georgia's interim leadership or parliament.
(AP, 12/10/03)
2003 Dec 29, A Georgia rocket attack damaged offices of an independent TV station.
(WSJ, 12/30/03, p.A1)
2004 Jan 4, The former Soviet republic of Georgia voted for a successor to President Eduard Shevardnadze. Mikhail Saakashvili, Georgia's young firebrand opposition leader, declared himself the victor in presidential elections with some 85% of the vote.
(AP, 1/5/04)(SFC, 1/5/04, p.A3)
2004 Jan 8, Authorities in Georgia's autonomous region of Adzharia imposed a state of emergency, fearing the newly elected Georgian president may try to rein in the province.
(AP, 1/8/04)
2004 Jan 18, In Georgia an explosion at a scientific institute in Tbilisi killed two people and injured two others. It occurred during a transfer of nitrogen, an indication that a canister of the gas could have blown up.
(AP, 1/19/04)
2004 Jan 25, Mikhail Saakashvili was inaugurated as Georgia's president.
(AP, 1/25/05)
2004 Feb 26, Mikhail Saakashvili, the new president of Georgia, said he is ready to negotiate full autonomy for the separatist Abkhazia region to end the decade-long conflict.
(AP, 2/26/04)
2004 Mar 14, Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili put the country's military on alert after the restive Adzharia region barred him from entering.
(AP, 3/14/04)
2004 Mar 15, Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili put trade restrictions on Adzharia (Ajaria) after Aslan Abashidze ignored a deadline to accept federal authority.
(AP, 3/14/04)
2004 Mar 18, Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili met with Aslan Abashidze in Batumi, Ajaria, to settle misunderstandings.
(Econ, 3/20/04, p.54)
2004 Mar 19, Georgia's authorities lifted sanctions against the defiant Adzharia (Ajaria) region, carrying out a new agreement aimed to avert tensions.
(AP, 3/19/04)
2004 Mar 28, Georgians voted in the country's third election in less than six months. Supporters of President Mikhail Saakashvili swept to victory in Georgia's parliamentary election, according to early results.
(AP, 3/28/04)(AP, 3/29/04)
2004 Apr 2, Georgian authorities reported that they had detained four men on suspicion of plotting to assassinate the president, and officials accused the autonomous province of Adzharia (Ajaria) of being behind the alleged plot.
(AP, 4/2/04)
2004 Apr 19, The annual environmental Goldman Prizes were awarded in SF. Winners included Manana Kochladze of Georgia for winning concessions to protect villagers and a pristine gorge from an oil pipeline.
(SFC, 4/19/04, p.B5)
2004 May 2, Adzharian (Ajaria) forces blew up the three major bridges connecting their recalcitrant province with the rest of Georgia in what their leader said was a preventive measure against Georgian military action.
(AP, 5/2/04)
2004 May 5, Russian foreign minister Igor Ivanov helped ease Aslan Abashidze out of Adzharia (Ajaria), Georgia.
(Econ, 5/8/04, p.49)
2004 May 6, The leader of the breakaway region of Adzharia fled after street protests, and Georgia's president flew into the restive province, vowing to pursue the integration of two other separatist regions.
(AP, 5/6/04)
2004 May, Georgia’s Pres. Saakashvili asked Kakha Bendukidze (48), industrialist, to return to Georgia from Russia and serve as the new economy minister. Bendukidze returned in June and began work.
(Econ, 7/31/04, p.56)
2004 Aug 15, Sporadic gunfire and shelling took place overnight in the disputed Georgian region of South Ossetia in violation of a fragile ceasefire, wounding seven Georgian servicemen.
(AFP, 8/15/04)
2004 Aug 17, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili appealed to world leaders to convene an international conference on the conflict in breakaway South Ossetia, where daily exchanges of gunfire threaten to spark a war. The province operated as a conduit for smuggling between Georgia and Russia.
(AP, 8/17/04)(Econ, 8/21/04, p.40)
2004 Aug 18, In South Ossetia 3 Georgian peacekeepers were killed in overnight shooting.
(AP, 8/18/04)
2004 Dec 5, In Abkhazia (Georgia) the two candidates vying for the region's presidency agreed to conduct new elections and run on a joint ticket.
(AP, 12/6/04)
2004 Irakly Okruashvili, Georgia’s interior minister, sacked some 12,000 police officers as part of a major anti-corruption drive.
(Econ, 9/18/04, p.56)
2004 Georgia’s Pres. Saakashvili installed Levan Varshalomidze to replace Aslan Abashidze as head of the Ajaria region.
(Econ, 8/20/05, p.42)
2005 Feb 1, In Gori, Georgia, a car bomb exploded outside a police station, killing three policemen and injuring 13 other people.
(AP, 2/1/05)
2005 Feb 3, PM Zurab Zhvania, who helped lead Georgia's revolution that toppled the corruption-tainted regime of Eduard Shevardnadze, died in a friend's apartment from what officials claimed was an accidental gas leak from a heater.
(AP, 2/3/05)
2005 Feb 17, Georgia’s parliament approved Zurab Nogaideli as premier.
(WSJ, 2/18/05, p.A1)
2005 Mar 10, Georgia lawmakers voted unanimously for Russia to withdraw troops from soviet-era bases by Jan 1.
(WSJ, 3/11/05, p.A1)
2005 May 9, In Tbilisi Pres. Bush, before a cheering crowd of tens of thousands of people, said that the former Soviet republic of Georgia is proving to the world that determined people can rise up and claim their freedom from oppressive rulers.
(AP, 5/9/05)
2005 May 10, Cheered by tens of thousands in the former Soviet republic of Georgia, President Bush urged the spread of democracy across the former communist world and beyond.
(AP, 5/10/06)
2005 May 25, In Azerbaijan officials opened the first section of a $3.6 billion, 1,100-mile pipeline that will carry Caspian Sea oil to Western markets. The presidents of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Georgia and Turkey were on hand for the ceremony at the Sangachal oil terminal.
(AP, 5/25/05)(WSJ, 5/25/05, p.B2)
2005 May 30, Russia agreed to begin withdrawing its troops from two Soviet-era bases in Georgia this year, resolving one of the most serious disputes between Moscow and its pro-Western neighbor.
(AP, 5/30/05)
2005 Aug 2, Georgia’s Pres, Saakashvili said he is counting on US help to facedown Moscow and reassert control over Abkhazia and Southern Ossetia.
(WSJ, 8/2/05, p.A1)
2005 Aug 12, Leaders of Georgia and Ukraine called for an alliance that would champion democracy in the former Soviet lands.
(AP, 8/12/05)
2005 Sep 10, More than 500 U.S.-trained Georgian soldiers left for Iraq as part of a regular rotation of troops by the former Soviet republic.
(AP, 9/10/05)
2005 Nov 23, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili predicted his country will become a member of the Western military alliance NATO by 2009.
(Reuters, 11/24/05)
2006 Jan 11, In Georgia a court convicted a man of trying to assassinate President Bush and the leader of Georgia during a rally last year, and it sentenced him to life in prison. Vladimir Arutyunian (27) also was convicted of killing a policeman during a shootout while authorities were trying to arrest him several weeks after the May 10, 2005, grenade incident.
(AP, 1/11/06)
2006 Jan 22, Explosions hit pipelines running through southern Russia, cutting the natural gas supply to Georgia and Armenia during a cold snap.
(AP, 1/22/06)
2006 Jan 22, Georgia began receiving natural gas late in the day from Azerbaijan following explosions on pipelines in southern Russia that cut off delivery of gas to Georgia and its neighbor Armenia during a cold snap.
(AP, 1/23/06)
2006 Jan 24, Georgia’s energy minister said Iran has expressed a readiness to export natural gas to Georgia to make up for a sharp drop in Russian deliveries.
(AP, 1/24/06)
2006 Jan 27, Georgia's president said that Iran had agreed to start providing emergency gas supplies to the Caucasus mountain nation as early as this weekend, signaling an end to an energy crisis made worse by an extreme cold snap.
(AP, 1/27/06)
2006 Jan 29, Russia resumed sending natural gas to Georgia after finishing repairs to a major pipeline damaged by mysterious blasts a week earlier.
(AP, 1/29/06)
2006 Mar 9, About 8,000 Georgians took to the streets for the capital's biggest anti-government demonstration since President Mikhail Saakashvili was swept to power after leading the Rose Revolution protests more than two years ago.
(AP, 3/9/06)
2006 Mar 26, Georgian police stormed a prison in Tbilisi after inmates rioted in an escape attempt from Ortochala prison, sparking a gun battle that left two guards and an unknown number of inmates dead.
(AP, 3/27/06)
2006 Apr 6, It was reported that Russian health and sanitary officials had imposed a ban on Georgian and Moldovan wines effective May 1. Authorities said the wines contained pesticides and heavy metals. The ban was soon extended to brandy and sparkling wines.
(AP, 4/6/06)
2006 May 28, A new $4 billion pipeline from Baku, via Georgia to Ceyhan, Turkey, began pumping oil.
(Econ, 6/3/06, p.48)
2006 Jun 3, The long-awaited first shipment of Caspian oil from the new Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan (BTC) pipeline got on its way from a Turkish port.
(AFP, 6/4/06)
2006 Jul 5, Pres. Bush met with Pres. Saakashvili and backed Georgia’s bid to join NATO.
(WSJ, 7/6/06, p.A1)
2006 Jul 6, Four former officers in Georgia's Interior Ministry were convicted of causing bodily harm leading to death in the case of a banker, Sandro Girgvliani (28), whose beating and stabbing death became a political scandal in this former Soviet republic.
(AP, 7/6/06)
2006 Jul 13, The presidents of Turkey, Azerbaijan and Georgia formally opened a pipeline designed to bypass Russia and bring Caspian oil to Europe, a route that President Bush said would bolster global energy security.
(AP, 7/13/06)
2006 Jul 26, Georgian authorities reported sporadic fighting in a mountainous region where police are trying to subdue a defiant militia leader, the latest confrontation in a volatile former Soviet republic plagued by separatist movements.
(AP, 7/26/06)
2006 Jul 27, Georgia’s Pres. Saakashvili said his troops had established control over the Kodori Gorge area after Emzar Kvitsiani, a former presidential envoy, said he was reactivating a local militia.
(SFC, 7/28/06, p.A3)
2006 Aug 10, Rights activists said at least nine inmates have died in Georgian prisons in the past 10 days as the Caucasus Mountains nation suffers through high temperatures not seen in two decades.
(AP, 8/10/06)
2006 Sep 11, Leaders of the breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia said they would hold a referendum on independence in November, a move likely to infuriate the government in Tbilisi and stoke already spiraling tensions.
(AP, 9/11/06)
2006 Sep 29, Georgia charged four Russian military officers with spying, while Russian government planes evacuated dozens of diplomats and their relatives as the diplomatic dispute worsened between Moscow and the former Soviet republic.
(AP, 9/29/06)
2006 Sep 30, Russia said that it has suspended plans for further withdrawal of its troops from Georgia amid worsening relations between the two neighbors.
(AP, 9/30/06)
2006 Oct 2, Georgia released four Russian officers whose arrest on spying charges prompted Moscow to announce sweeping travel and communications sanctions in the worst bilateral crisis in years.
(AP, 10/2/06)
2006 Oct 3, Russia suspended all transport and postal links with Georgia until further notice, sharply escalating their dispute. The blockade caused economic problems for Armenia, Georgia's landlocked southern neighbor, since Russia is its main trading partner.
(AP, 10/3/06)(AP, 10/7/06)
2006 Oct 5, Georgians voted in municipal elections seen as a crucial test for President Mikhail Saakashvili during a diplomatic crisis with Russia.
(AP, 10/5/06)
2006 Oct 5, Russia froze Georgians’ work permits and nearly doubled its gas bill.
(WSJ, 10/6/06, p.A1)
2006 Oct 6, Opposition leaders alleged that Georgia's local and regional elections were riddled with fraud, but international monitors said the balloting was conducted "with general respect for fundamental freedoms."
(AP, 10/6/06)
2006 Oct 12, Georgia blocked the next round of talks on Russia's bid to join the World Trade Organization in retaliation for Moscow's blockade of its small southern neighbor.
(AP, 10/12/06)
2006 Oct 24, Georgia's Foreign Ministry said it had protested to the UN about Russia's crackdown on illegal Georgian migrants, demanding a stop to what it called "persecution on ethnic grounds."
(AP, 10/24/06)
2006 Oct 26, A Georgian man was killed and another was wounded when they stepped on a mine in a volatile area near the breakaway province of South Ossetia.
(AP, 10/26/06)
2006 Nov 2, Russia's state-controlled natural gas monopoly said that it would more than double the price it charges Georgia, further heightening tensions between the ex-Soviet neighbors.
(AP, 11/2/06)
2006 Nov 12, Voters in the breakaway Georgian province of South Ossetia declared overwhelming backing for its independence drive in a referendum that underlined a sharp split between Russia and the West and is likely to increase tensions in the Caucasus region. A similar 1992 referendum proclaiming the province's independence went unnoticed by the international community, leaving it in limbo.
(AP, 11/12/06)(AP, 11/13/06)
2006 Dec 14, In Georgia the last train carrying military hardware and property owned by units of the Group of Russian Troops left the Tbilisi garrison for Armenia. The last of Russia’s servicemen were to leave the next day. This ended a 200-year-old Russian presence in Tbilisi.
(www.interfax.ru/e/B/politics/28.html?id_issue=11647105)
2006 Dec 22, A top executive with Russian gas giant OAO Gazprom said Georgia will pay more than double what it pays now for Russian natural gas under a new agreement.
(AP, 12/22/06)
2006 Thomas Goltz authored “Georgia Diary: A Chronicle of War and Political Chaos in the Post-Soviet Caucasus."
(WSJ, 11/18/06, p.P11)
2006 A Georgian undercover agent made contact with a Russian seller of uranium in North Ossetia. The seller was arrested when they met in Tbilisi with 3.5 ounces of enriched uranium, which made it weapons grade material.
(SFC, 1/25/07, p.A18)
2007 Jan 18, President Vladimir Putin ordered Russia's ambassador to Georgia to return to the Georgian capital after recalling him four months ago, saying that the two countries must "normalize" badly strained ties.
(AP, 1/18/07)
2007 Feb 7, Georgia signed a regional cooperation agreement with Azerbaijan and Turkey which included plans for a railway connecting the three countries.
(WSJ, 2/28/07, p.A6)(http://tinyurl.com/2gbbgg)
2007 Mar 5, Badri Patarkatsishvili, one of the most famous Georgian oligarchs, left Georgia. His departure was announced in London as the relocation of his activities of "Georgia in the West," underscoring the desire to leave the country definitively. The millionaire, who holds first-rank influence in both finances and the media, co-holds one of the most important Georgian media concerns, Imedi, which includes a radio station and a television station.
(www.caucaz.com/home_eng/breve_contenu.php?id=307)
2007 Mar 11, In Georgia’s Kodori Valley Russian helicopters coordinated a ground and air attack on 3 settlements and fired a guided missile at a Georgian government building.
(WSJ, 1/5/07, p.A8)
2007 Apr, Georgia reported that outbreaks of African swine fever began at the end of April in 10 regions across the country. 20,000 pigs were soon slaughtered. In June the UN said that the outbreak could have a "catastrophic" economic impact unless its spread is halted.
(AP, 6/8/07)
2007 May 11, Authorities in Georgia's breakaway region of South Ossetia launched a blockade of all ethnic Georgian villages in the province and demanded that the central government withdraw its police troops from the settlements.
(AP, 5/11/07)
2007 May 20, Guram Sharadze (67), the leader of a Georgian opposition movement, was gunned down on a street in a central part of the capital, Tbilisi.
(AP, 5/20/07)
2007 Jun 19, Georgia border agents blocked a car trying to smuggle radioactive plutonium and beryllium from Azerbaijan.
(WSJ, 6/20/07, p.A1)
2007 Jun 28, Hundreds of ethnic Georgians confronted Russian peacekeeping forces in the breakaway region of South Ossetia, throwing paint and gasoline on the troops and forcing them to stop blocking a road project.
(AP, 6/28/07)
2007 Aug 7, Georgia accused Russia of "undisguised aggression," saying two Russian fighter jets intruded on its airspace and fired a missile that landed near a house. Russia denied the allegation.
(AP, 8/7/07)
2007 Aug 24, Georgia said it fired on a Russian plane flying over its territory. The Tbilisi City Court, behind closed doors, convicted 13 people from minor opposition parties for plotting a violent overthrow of the government. Maia Topuria, the lead defendant and head of the pro-Moscow Justice party, was sentenced to 8 ½ years in prison.
(WSJ, 8/25/07, p.A1)(www.geotimes.ge/index.php?m=home&newsid=6353)
2007 Aug 25, A senior official of the separatist region said a plane of uncertain origin went down over Abkhazia, a day after Georgia reported that its forces fired on a plane believed to be Russian that had violated the country's airspace.
(AP, 8/25/07)
2007 Sep 14, Georgia’s defense minister said Georgia will cut the size of its military contingent in Iraq from 2,000 soldiers and other personnel to around 300 by next summer.
(AP, 9/14/07)
2007 Sep 20, A clash between Georgian and separatist Abkhazian forces too place some 330 yards inside Abkhaz-held territory. Several Abkhaz soldiers were wounded and 2 former Russian military officers were killed.
(SFC, 10/30/07, p.A6)
2007 Sep 27, Irakli Okruashvili, Georgia's hawkish former defense minister, was detained on corruption charges, days after he alleged that President Mikhail Saakashvili had ordered him to kill a prominent businessman.
(AP, 9/27/07)
2007 Sep 28, Thousands of opposition supporters rallied in Georgia's capital, demanding that the president step down following the arrest of Irakly Okruashvili (33), a former defense minister who accused the leader of involvement in a murder plot.
(AP, 9/28/07)(Econ, 10/6/07, p.58)
2007 Oct 7, Irakly Okruashvili, Georgia's former defense minister, retracted allegations that the president of this former Soviet republic was involved in a murder plot and other corruption. Okruashvili's lawyer, Eka Beselia, said the statements "were made under duress."
(AP, 10/8/07)
2007 Oct 10, Ministers from Azerbaijan, Georgia, Lithuania, Poland and Ukraine signed a deal to build an oil pipeline linking the Black and Baltic seas.
(WSJ, 10/11/07, p.A18)
2007 Oct 15, The Security Council voted unanimously to extend the UN observer mission in Georgia, expressing "serious concern" at violence that has escalated tensions between Georgia and the breakaway region of Abkhazia.
(AP, 10/15/07)
2007 Nov 7, In Georgia police forced dozens of opposition supporters from a site in Tbilisi, where five days of protests had drawn thousands, but demonstrators later returned and renewed their calls for the president's resignation. Georgia’s Imedi television station, regarded by the government as an opposition mouthpiece, went off the air after riot police entered its headquarters. Imedi was owned by opposition tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili. The government declared a 15-day state of emergency.
(AP, 11/7/07)(AP, 11/8/07)(Econ, 11/10/07, p.66)(Econ, 1/12/08, p.41)
2007 Nov 8, Georgia's pro-Western Pres. Mikhail Saakashvili said that the country would hold early presidential elections in January to defuse a crisis fueled by protests against him. Troops armed with hard rubber clubs patrolled the center of Tbilisi to enforce a state of emergency imposed after a violent crackdown on anti-government protesters.
(AP, 11/8/07)
2007 Nov 9, Georgian opposition leaders said they would end streets protests against President Mikhail Saakashvili after he called for an early presidential election for January.
(AP, 11/9/07)
2007 Nov 15, Georgia’s parliament lifted the country’s state of emergency imposed last week by Pres. Saakashvili.
(WSJ, 11/16/07, p.A1)
2007 Nov 15, A top Russian general said that Russia has completed its withdrawal of troops that had been based in Georgia since the Soviet collapse. He said peacekeepers remained in Abkhazia along with forces in South Ossetia with the participation of Georgia.
(AP, 11/14/07)
2007 Nov 16, Georgia’s President Mikhail Saakashvili dismissed the prime minister and nominated an influential banker for the post in an apparent attempt to win votes ahead of a hastily called presidential election.
(AP, 11/16/07)
2007 Nov 21, The presidents of Azerbaijan, Georgia and Turkey launched the construction of a railroad that will link ex-Soviet republics in the Caucasus and Central Asia with Europe, bypassing Russia.
(AP, 11/21/07)
2007 Dec 26, Georgia's top television station suspended its broadcasts, saying it was protesting the pressure authorities have exerted because of the station's links to a billionaire presidential contender challenging the government.
(AP, 12/26/07)
2007 Kakha Bendukidze, Georgian industrialist, founded the Free University of Tbilisi to teach law, business and languages. Each graduate was expected to finance a new student.
(Econ, 8/21/10, p.41)
2008 Jan 5, Georgians voted to determine whether to keep Mikhail Saakashvili as president in the former Soviet republic, where he was once considered a symbol of democratic reform but now faces accusations of authoritarian leanings. Saakashvili's supporters poured onto the streets, tooting car horns and waving white-and-red national flags, celebrating victory based on exit poll results. Saakashvili received 52.8% of the vote according to preliminary results.
(AP, 1/5/08)(AP, 1/6/08)(AP, 1/7/08)
2008 Jan 6, In Georgia several thousand people rallied in Tbilisi, claiming early election results that indicated Mikhail Saakashvili would narrowly win a second presidential term were fraudulent.
(AP, 1/6/08)
2008 Jan 7, President Mikhail Saakashvili said his re-election demonstrates that Georgia is on the road to becoming a European democracy, while his opponents denounced the vote as fraudulent and vowed to renew street protests.
(AP, 1/7/08)
2008 Jan 10, In Georgia authorities formally charged Badri Patarkatsishvili, a billionaire businessman, who ran in this month's presidential election with plotting to overthrow the government. Patarkatsishvili left Georgia in November and has spent time in Britain and Israel. He has acknowledged offering large sums of money to police if they side with protesters.
(AP, 1/11/08)
2008 Jan 13, In Georgia tens of thousands of opposition supporters rallied in Tbilisi to protest what they denounced as massive vote fraud that helped US-allied Mikhail Saakashvili win a second presidential term.
(AP, 1/13/08)
2008 Jan 15, In Georgia tens of thousands of people demonstrated in Tbilisi, pressing for a presidential runoff but celebrating an agreement giving the opposition more control over the main state-funded television station.
(AP, 1/15/08)
2008 Feb 12, Badri Patarkatsishvili (52), a Georgian tycoon, was found dead in his mansion near London. Police said they were treating the death as suspicious. He had claimed he was the target of assassination plot after helping lead anti-government protests in his homeland. He had built his fortune in Russia, where he became Berezovsky's business partner. However, the two men claimed in British court documents that the Russian government forced them to sell their stakes in oil company Sibneft, Russian Aluminum and television channel ORT for a fraction of their value. Interim tests indicated that Patarkatsishvili died of natural causes.
(AP, 2/13/08)(AP, 2/14/08)
2008 Mar 5, South Ossetia appealed for international recognition as an independent nation, further adding to simmering tensions in Georgia and throughout the strategic South Caucasus region.
(AP, 3/6/08)
2008 Mar 6, A lawmaker said Abkhazia, a region that broke away from Georgian government control in the 1990s, intends to seek international recognition as an independent nation, citing Kosovo as a precedent.
(AP, 3/6/08)
2008 Mar 25, Air travel between Georgia and Russia resumed, more than 17 months after Moscow suspended flights because of tension between the ex-Soviet neighbors.
(AP, 3/25/08)
2008 Apr 3, President Bush won NATO's endorsement for his plan to build a missile defense system in Europe over Russian objections. The proposal also advanced with Czech officials announcing an agreement to install a missile tracking site for the system in their country. NATO decided not to put Georgia and Ukraine on track to join the alliance after vehement Russian opposition, but the alliance pledged that the strategically important Black Sea nations will become members one day.
(AP, 4/3/08)
2008 Apr 20, A Georgian unmanned reconnaissance flight was shot down over the Georgian rebel region of Abkhazia. The next day Georgia's air force commander said a Russian fighter jet shot down the spy plane as it flew over Abkhazia, but Russia said it had been shot down by separatist forces and that the flight violated UN ceasefire agreements. A UN report on May 26 said a Russian jet shot down the spy drone.
(Reuters, 4/22/08)(AP, 4/22/08)(SFC, 5/27/08, p.A12)
2008 Apr 29, Russia announced it was beefing up its peacekeeping force in Georgia's breakaway Abkhazia and South Ossetia regions, saying it had evidence Tbilisi was readying its forces for an attack.
(Reuters, 4/29/08)
2008 May 1, Russia said an extra contingent of its troops had begun arriving in Georgia's breakaway region of Abkhazia, a move Tbilisi said was an illegal act of military aggression.
(AP, 5/1/08)
2008 May 4, Abkhazian anti-aircraft forces shot down 2 unmanned Georgian spy planes. A Georgian Foreign Ministry official, dismissed the claims as "completely absurd disinformation" aimed at increasing tension in the area.
(AP, 5/4/08)
2008 May 8, Georgia's breakaway region of Abkhazia said it had shot down another Georgian spy drone.
(Reuters, 5/8/08)
2008 May 21, Georgia held parliamentary elections.
(AP, 5/22/08)
2008 May 22, Partial returns and an exit poll showed President Mikhail Saakashvili's ruling party heading for a strong majority in Georgia's parliamentary election. United Opposition co-leader David Gamkrelidze alleged widespread cheating and pressure on opponents by authorities in areas outside Tbilisi.
(AP, 5/22/08)
2008 May, Georgia’s population, as it aspired to NATO membership, was about 4.5 million.
(Econ, 5/24/08, p.70)
2008 Jun 5, The European Parliament called for the peacekeeping mandate for Russian troops in the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia to be revised. The chamber also demanded the EU sends its own border mission into the conflict zone in Abkhazia.
(AP, 6/5/08)
2008 Jun 6, Russia's new Pres. Medvedev met with leaders of a fractious alliance of ex-Soviet republics, warning Ukraine and Georgia not to lead their countries into NATO.
(AP, 6/6/08)
2008 Jul 29, Russian proxies in South Ossetia started shelling pro-Georgian villages there.
(Econ, 1/23/10, p.78)
2008 Aug 2, Overnight fighting that included sniper and mortar fire between Georgian forces and separatists in the breakaway South Ossetia region left six people dead and 13 wounded.
(AP, 8/2/08)
2008 Aug 3, The breakaway republic of South Ossetia began sending hundreds of children across the border to its Russian ally amid increasing violence between the republic and Georgian government forces.
(AP, 8/3/08)
2008 Aug 7, Heavy shelling overnight in the Georgian breakaway province of South Ossetia wounded at least 21 people. Cyber attacks from Russia began to target Georgian government Web sites. An organization known as the Russian Business Network was the leading suspect in the attacks. Georgia’s Pres. Saakashvili ordered the shelling of Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia.
(AP, 8/7/08)(WSJ, 8/12/08, p.A9)(Econ, 8/30/08, p.49)
2008 Aug 8, Georgian troops launched a major military offensive to regain control of South Ossetia, prompting a furious response from Russia, which sent tanks into the region. The convoy was expected to reach the provincial capital by evening. Georgia said it shot down two Russian combat planes. Separatist officials in South Ossetia said 15 civilians had been killed in fighting overnight. Georgia later acknowledged that it used M85 cluster munition near the Roki tunnel that connects South Ossetia with Russia, while Russia denied use of cluster bombs.
(AP, 8/8/08)(AP, 9/1/08)
2008 Aug 9, Georgia, the third largest contributor to the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq, said it's pulling out its 2,000-strong contingent from Iraq to join the fighting in the breakaway province of South Ossetia.
(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 9, Separatist forces in Georgia's breakaway province of Abkhazia launched air and artillery strikes to drive Georgian troops from their bridgehead in the region. The Abkhazian move was prompted by Georgia's military action to regain control over another breakaway province, South Ossetia.
(AP, 8/9/08)
2008 Aug 9, Russia sent hundreds of tanks and troops into the separatist province of South Ossetia and bombed Georgian towns in a major escalation of the conflict that has left scores of civilians dead and wounded. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told reporters in Moscow that some 1,500 people have been killed, with the death toll rising. The death toll in South Ossetia was later put at fewer than 200. Russian military aircraft bombed the Georgian town of Gori. Georgia's President Mikhail Saakashvili proposed a cease-fire. As part of his proposal, Georgian troops were pulled out of Tskhinvali and had been ordered to stop responding to Russian shelling.
(AP, 8/9/08)(Econ, 8/30/08, p.49)
2008 Aug 10, Georgian troops retreated from the breakaway province of South Ossetia and their government pressed for a truce, overwhelmed by Russian firepower as the conflict threatened to set off a wider war. Georgia said it has shot down 10 Russian planes, including four brought down Aug 9. It also claimed to have captured two Russian pilots, who were shown on Georgian television. Ukraine warned Russia it could bar Russian navy ships from returning to their base in the Crimea because of their deployment to Georgia's coast.
(AP, 8/10/08)
2008 Aug 11, Swarms of Russian jets launched new raids on Georgian territory and Georgia faced the threat of a second front of fighting as Russia demanded that Georgia disarm troops near the breakaway province of Abkhazia.
(AP, 8/11/08)
2008 Aug 12, Georgia's Pres. Mikhail Saakashvili said his government will declare that its breakaway regions are occupied territories and will designate Russian peacekeepers as occupying forces. Russia ordered a halt to military action in Georgia, after five days of air and land attacks sent Georgia's army into headlong retreat and left towns and military bases destroyed. A Dutch television journalist was killed overnight when Russian warplanes bombed the central Georgian city of Gori. Russia later counted 133 civilian deaths in South Ossetia. Rights activists later said fewer than 100 civilians were killed in South Ossetia. The war cost some 850 lives and left over 35,000 displaced civilians, mot of the Georgian.
(AP, 8/12/08)(Econ, 8/23/08, p.43)(WSJ, 9/12/08, p.A1)(Econ, 10/3/09, p.65)
2008 Aug 13, Russian tanks rolled into the crossroads city of Gori then thrust deep into Georgian territory, violating the truce designed to end the six-day war. Georgia said that 175 Georgians had died in five days of air and ground attacks that left homes in smoldering ruins. EU foreign ministers agreed in principle to send monitors to supervise a French-brokered ceasefire between Russia and Georgia in the breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia. Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin said Russia will spend at least $400 million in 2008 on restoring South Ossetia's battered capital Tskhinvali.
(AP, 8/13/08)(Reuters, 8/13/08)
2008 Aug 14, Georgian and Russian troops faced off at a checkpoint outside the key city of Gori, calling an already shaky cease-fire into question. An American official said Russia appears to be sabotaging airfields and other military infrastructure as its forces pull back. The Russian General Prosecutor's office said it has formally opened a genocide probe into Georgian treatment of South Ossetians. For its part, Georgia this week filed a suit against Russia in the International Court of Justice, alleging murder, rape and mass expulsions in both provinces.
(AP, 8/14/08)
2008 Aug 15, Russian troops allowed some humanitarian supplies into Georgia’s city of Gori but kept up their blockade of the strategically located city, raising doubts about Russia's intentions. Relief planes swooped into Tbilisi with tons of supplies for the estimated 100,000 people uprooted by the fighting. An international rights group said it has evidence that Russian warplanes dropped cluster bombs in civilian areas in Georgia.
(AP, 8/15/08)
2008 Aug 16, Russian forces pulled back from the center of a town not far from Georgia's capital after Russia's president signed a cease-fire deal. Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov later suggested there would be no immediate broader withdrawal. Georgia's Foreign Ministry said Saturday that Russian-backed separatists from the province of Abkhazia had taken over 13 villages in Georgia and a power plant. Russian troops blew up a key railroad bridge linking the Caucasus to the Black Sea coast.
(AP, 8/16/08)(SSFC, 8/17/08, p.A4)
2008 Aug 17, The Kremlin promised to start withdrawing combat troops from Georgia on August 18, as Western pressure mounted on Russia to quit the ex-Soviet republic.
(AFP, 8/17/08)
2008 Aug 18, Russia said its military began to withdraw from the conflict zone in Georgia, but left unclear exactly where troops and tanks will operate under the cease-fire that ended days of fighting in the former Soviet republic.
(AP, 8/18/08)
2008 Aug 19, Russian soldiers took 20 Georgian troops prisoner at a key port in western Georgia and commandeered American Humvees awaiting shipment back to the United States after taking part in earlier US-Georgian military exercises. Georgia and Russia exchanged prisoners captured during their brief war.
(AP, 8/19/08)
2008 Aug 20, A top Russian general said 64 of the country's soldiers were killed and 323 wounded in this month's fighting with Georgia. Russia informed Norway that it plans to suspend all military ties with NATO, a day after the military alliance urged Moscow to withdraw its forces from Georgia. Georgia later reported that 170 of its soldiers were killed in the war.
(AP, 8/20/08)(AP, 8/21/08)(SSFC, 8/24/08, p.A10)
2008 Aug 21, Russian forces blocked the only land entrance to Georgia's main port city, a day before Russia promised to complete a troop pullout from its ex-Soviet neighbor.
(AP, 8/21/08)
2008 Aug 22, A Russian armored column moved away from a base in western Georgia and Russian forces also were leaving the key central city of Gori, the day that Russia's president had said a pullback would be complete.
(AP, 8/22/08)
2008 Aug 23, A top Russian general said his country's forces will keep patrolling the key Georgian Black Sea port of Poti even though it lies outside the areas where Russia claims it has the right to station soldiers in Georgia.
(AP, 8/23/08)
2008 Aug 24, The USS McFaul, a US Navy warship carrying humanitarian aid, anchored at the Georgian port of Batumi, sending a strong signal of support to an embattled ally as Russian forces built up around two separatist regions. In central Georgia, an oil train exploded and caught fire, sending plumes of black smoke into the air. A Georgian official said the train hit a land mine and blamed the explosion on departing Russian forces.
(AP, 8/24/08)
2008 Aug 25, Russia's parliament voted unanimously to urge the president to recognize the independence of Georgia's two breakaway regions, a move likely to stoke further tensions between Moscow and the small Caucasus nation's Western allies. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev warned ex-Soviet Moldova against repeating Georgia's mistake of trying to use force to seize back control of Transdniestria, a pro-Moscow breakaway region.
(AP, 8/25/08)(Reuters, 8/25/08)
2008 Aug 26, Russia formally recognized Abkhazia and South Ossetia, the breakaway Georgian territories at the heart of its war with Georgia, heightening tensions with the West as the US dispatched a military ship bearing aid to a port city still patrolled by Russian troops. In a direct challenge to Russia, the US announced it intends to deliver humanitarian aid to the beleaguered Georgian port city of Poti, which Russian troops still control through checkpoints on the city's outskirts.
(AP, 8/26/08)
2008 Aug 27, A US military ship docked at the southern Georgian port of Batumi. Meanwhile, Russia's missile cruiser, the Aurora, and two missile boats, anchored at the port of Sukhumi, the capital of Abkhazia. The moves by both sides underscored an escalating standoff between Moscow and the West over this small Caucasus nation devastated by war with Russia.
(AP, 8/27/08)
2008 Aug 27, The Group of Seven (G7) industrialized democracies condemned Russia for its actions in Georgia, underlining the country's growing estrangement from the West.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 28, Russian forces turned over 12 Georgian soldiers on the border of Abkhazia. Georgia's foreign minister said ethnic Georgians were being cleared from their homes in South Ossetia. A joint declaration from the Shanghai Cooperation Organization denounced the use of force and called for respect for every country's territorial integrity. Mikhail Mindzayev, the interior minister of South Ossetia, said an unmanned Georgian spy plane was shot down over South Ossetia by local forces.
(AP, 8/28/08)
2008 Aug 29, A Georgian Foreign Ministry official says Georgia is to recall all diplomatic staff from its embassy in Moscow because of the Russian military presence in Georgia.
(AP, 8/29/08)
2008 Aug 30, The UN says Russian soldiers are telling thousands of refugees in Georgia who want to return to their homes that their security can't be guaranteed. All hoped to return to villages that are in the "security zones" that Russia has claimed for itself. Russian PM Vladimir Putin urged the EU to ignore calls to punish Moscow over the Georgia conflict as Tbilisi appealed for targeted punishment of the Russian leadership.
(AP, 8/30/08)(AFP, 8/30/08)
2008 Aug 31, President Dmitry Medvedev says Russia will follow the recognition of Georgia's breakaway provinces with agreements on economic and military aid.
(AP, 8/31/08)
2008 Sep 1, Hundreds of thousands of Georgians joined together in anti-Russian protests.
(Econ, 9/6/08, p.32)
2008 Sep 3, A US Navy ship loaded with humanitarian aid steamed through the Dardanelles on its way to Georgia, as the Bush administration prepared to roll out a $1 billion economic aid package for the ex-Soviet republic.
(AP, 9/3/08)
2008 Sep 4, In Georgia US Vice President Dick Cheney condemned Russia for what he called an "illegitimate, unilateral attempt" to redraw this US ally's borders by force.
(AP, 9/4/08)
2008 Sep 5, The flagship of the US Navy's Mediterranean fleet anchored outside the key Georgian port of Poti, bringing in tons of humanitarian aid to a port still partially occupied by hundreds of Russian troops.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 5, EU nations called for an international probe to find out which country should shoulder responsibility for starting the conflict between Georgia and Russia.
(AP, 9/5/08)
2008 Sep 7, Italy's foreign minister, after meeting US Vice President Dick Cheney, said the EU wants to work closely with the United States in resolving the Georgian crisis.
(AP, 9/7/08)
2008 Sep 8, French President Nicolas Sarkozy pressed Moscow to honor its pledge to withdraw troops from Georgia, while Russian soldiers prevented international aid convoys from visiting Georgian villages in a tense zone around the breakaway province of South Ossetia. Pres. Medvedev and Sarkozy revised the EU-brokered deal to end the fighting between Russia and Georgia. Medvedev said 200 EU monitors would deploy to regions surrounding South Ossetia and Abkhazia by next month. After that, Russian troops would pull out of those regions by Oct. 11 to a line that preceded last month's fighting.
(AP, 9/8/08)(AP, 9/9/08)
2008 Sep 9, Russia said it will station 7,600 troops in South Ossetia and in Abkhazia, announcing an imposing long-term presence less than a day after agreeing to pull forces back from areas surrounding the provinces.
(AP, 9/9/08)(WSJ, 9/10/08, p.A1)
2008 Sep 10, A Georgian police officer was killed by gunfire that came from the direction of a Russian checkpoint near separatist South Ossetia.
(AP, 9/10/08)
2008 Sep 10, Israeli defense officials say the government has told all businessmen involved in military sales to Georgia to immediately cease visits to the former Soviet republic. The officials said the directive was decided upon this week because Israel is concerned about damage to its relations with Russia.
(AP, 9/10/08)
2008 Sep 13, Hundreds of Russian forces packed up and withdrew from positions in western Georgia. A Georgian official said Russia had met a deadline for a partial pullout a month after the war between the two former Soviet republics. A Georgian policeman at a post near Abkhazia was killed by gunfire that came from the direction of a position where Abkhazian and Russian forces have been based. Some 1,200 Russian servicemen still remained at 19 checkpoints and other positions, 12 outside South Ossetia and seven outside Abkhazia.
(AP, 9/13/08)
2008 Sep 16, Georgia’s government said intercepted mobile phone calls show that Russian tanks and troops invaded before Georgia unleashed its offensive against South Ossetia, pressing its claim that Russia was the aggressor in the war last month.
(AP, 9/16/08)
2008 Sep 17, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev signed friendship treaties with Georgia's breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia and promised them the backing of Russia's armed forces.
(AP, 9/17/08)
2008 Sep 22, Georgian forces shot down a Russian drone near the breakaway province of South Ossetia.
(AP, 9/23/08)
2008 Sep 29, In Georgia almost 300 monitors from 22 EU nations were in place to oversee Russia's promised troop withdrawal from the large swaths it has occupied since the August war.
(AP, 9/29/08)
2008 Oct 1, EU monitors began patrolling Georgian territory and Russian troops allowed some of them into a buffer zone around the breakaway region of South Ossetia despite earlier warnings from Moscow they would be blocked.
(AP, 10/1/08)
2008 Oct 3, A car exploded outside the Russian military's headquarters in South Ossetia, killing 7 people and wounding 3. The South Ossetian government said a car, that had been confiscated in an ethnic Georgian village after weapons were found in it, exploded near a building where leaders of the Russian peacekeeping force were located.
(AP, 10/3/08)(www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,432172,00.html)
2008 Oct 5, A Georgian Interior Ministry official said Russian troops have begun dismantling positions in the so-called security zones inside Georgia that they have occupied since August's brief but intense war.
(AP, 10/5/08)
2008 Oct 8, Russian forces pulled back from positions outside South Ossetia, bulldozing a camp at a key checkpoint and withdrawing into the separatist region as EU monitors and relieved Georgian residents looked on.
(AP, 10/8/08)
2008 Oct 22, Officials said the EU, the US and other international donors have pledged more than $4.5 billion for rebuilding parts of Georgia that were damaged in its war with Russia.
(AP, 10/22/08)
2008 Oct 25, In Georgia an explosion killed Gia Mebonia, mayor of the small town of Mujhava, while he was inspecting a house damaged by overnight shelling near the separatist region of Abkhazia. A villager was also killed and a local police officer was seriously injured.
(AP, 10/25/08)
2008 Oct 27, Georgia's Pres. Saakashvili dismissed PM Vladimir Gurgenizde and recommended Grigol Mgaloblishvili (35), the country's ambassador to Turkey, as his replacement. Saakashvili said Gurgenizde would now head a government finance commission.
(AP, 10/27/08)
2008 Oct 29, Russia's parliament quickly ratified treaties cementing close economic and military ties with Georgia's two breakaway provinces.
(AP, 10/29/08)
2008 Nov 4, Human Rights Watch reported that both Georgia and Russia used cluster bombs during their brief summer war. Georgia’s bombs, purchased from Israel, killed at least 3 Georgian civilians, including 2 who touched unexploded bombs and died after the fighting ended. Many of the bombs were said to have malfunctioned.
(WSJ, 11/4/08, p.A12)
2008 Nov 7, In Georgia thousands of the United Opposition coalition demonstrated in the first major protest against President Mikhail Saakashvili since the August war with Russia. At least two significant opposition parties, The Republican Party and the Christian Democrats, stayed away from the protest, citing the need for postwar unity against Russia.
(AP, 11/7/08)
2008 Nov 10, An explosion killed two Georgian police officers near the disputed region of South Ossetia. EU monitors called the attack an unacceptable breach of the cease-fire that ended the Georgia-Russia war.
(AP, 11/10/08)
2008 Nov 15, A Georgian policeman was shot dead by a group of armed Abkhazians. The group was said to have entered Georgian-controlled territory to plant land mines. Abkhazian presidential envoy Ruslan Kishmariya said police from the separatist side killed one and wounded two Georgian "saboteurs" in the tense Gali district.
(AP, 11/15/08)
2008 Nov 19, Georgia and Russia held their first major, mediated talks since their August war.
(WSJ, 11/20/08, p.A1)
2008 Nov 20, Georgian officials said Russian and separatist forces attacked a Georgian police checkpoint near the village of Ganmukhuri, near the breakaway province of Abkhazia. Anatoly Zaitsev, the chief of staff for the Abkhaz armed forces, said that a group of Abkhaz troops patrolling the area were shelled from the Georgian side and returned fire, and no Russian troops were involved.
(AP, 11/20/08)
2008 Nov 23, In Georgia gunfire that broke out as Pres. Saakashvili and Polish Pres. Lech Kaczynski were traveling near a roadblock at the edge of Georgia-controlled territory. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said there was no gunfire from Russian or South Ossetian positions and suggested Georgia engineered the incident to discredit Russia and South Ossetia. In Tbilisi Nino Burjanadze, a former ally of Pres. Saakashvili, founded a new party: the Democratic Movement-United Georgia.
(AP, 11/24/08)(WSJ, 11/24/08, p.A8)
2008 Nov 29, Georgia said it is cutting diplomatic relations with Nicaragua after the Central American nation recognized the breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
(AP, 11/29/08)
2008 Dec 13, Russian troops retook Perevi village near the breakaway region of South Ossetia just hours after withdrawing. The move drew criticism from Georgia, the EU and US Senator John Kerry, who was on a half-day visit to Tbilisi.
(AP, 12/13/08)
2008 Dec 22, OSCE talks on the Georgia collapsed, when Russia demanded the group join Moscow in recognizing the statehood of the provinces of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The mission will expire on Dec 31.
(AP, 12/23/08)
2009 Jan 19, Russia released a text by President Dmitry Medvedev ordering the government to introduce economic sanctions against countries supplying weapons to Georgia.
(AP, 1/19/09)
2009 Jan 30, Georgia's PM Grigol Mgaloblishvili (35) resigned, citing health reasons after just three months on the job as President Mikhail Saakashvili's second-in-command.
(AP, 1/30/09)
2009 Feb 18, Georgia and Russia agreed to let monitors visit anywhere they want in Georgia and its 2 breakaway provinces.
(WSJ, 2/19/09, p.A1)
2009 Mar 23, Georgian officials released videotapes allegedly showing opposition members buying weapons with the aim of sparking violence during demonstrations against the president planned for next month.
(AP, 3/24/09)
2009 Mar 29, In Russia the film "Olympius Inferno," was first broadcast on state television. It offering the Kremlin's version of the August war with Georgia and contained anti-American overtones, reflecting Russia's anger over US support for Georgia.
(AP, 3/31/09)
2009 Apr 9, In Georgia tens of thousands of protesters thronged the streets in front of the parliament, calling on Pres. Mikhail Saakashvili to step down in the largest opposition demonstration since last year's war with Russia.
(AP, 4/9/09)
2009 Apr 10, About 20,000 demonstrators kept up the pressure on Georgia's president to resign, with some pelting his residence with cabbages and carrots on a second day of protests.
(AP, 4/10/09)
2009 Apr 22, In Georgia thousands of opposition supporters from the provinces poured into the capital to join the protests aimed at forcing President Mikhail Saakashvili to step down.
(AP, 4/22/09)
2009 Apr 30, Russia signed a deal with Georgia's two breakaway regions giving Moscow the power to guard the borders of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, a move sharply criticized in Tbilisi.
(AP, 4/30/09)
2009 May 5, Georgia said it had ended a brief mutiny at a military base near the capital that broke out after the arrest of a former special forces commander accused of planning to disrupt NATO exercises.
(AP, 5/5/09)
2009 May 6, NATO launched military exercises in former Soviet Georgia after heavy criticism from neighboring Russia and a brief mutiny in the Georgian military.
(AP, 5/6/09)
2009 May 7, In Georgia opposition protesters clashed with police in Tbilisi in the first outbreak of violence since demonstrations began in April.
(Econ, 5/9/09, p.55)
2009 May 7, The European Union extended its hand to former Soviet republics, holding a summit to draw them closer into the EU orbit despite Russia's deep misgivings. Presidents, premiers and their deputies from 33 nations signed an agreement meant to extend the EU's political and economic ties. The six ex-Soviet republics to whom the “eastern partnership" would apply are Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine.
(AP, 5/7/09)(Econ, 1/10/15, p.49)
2009 May 11, Georgia's pro-Western president and four of his fiercest opponents failed to agree on a way to resolve the country's political crisis, a negotiator said, promising continued street demonstrations to demand his resignation.
(AP, 5/11/09)
2009 May 21, In Georgia police killed Giorgy Krialashvili, a former military officer accused of plotting mutiny, and wounded two others in an overnight gunbattle. Protesters condemned the shootings and blocked Tbilisi streets in the seventh week of an anti-government campaign.
(AP, 5/21/09)
2009 Jun 15, Moscow vetoed a Western-proposed resolution to extend the mandate of UN monitors in the breakaway region of Abkhazia. It designed to buy time to negotiate a long-term plan for the 16-year-old monitoring mission in the Black Sea rebel region.
(Reuters, 6/16/09)
2009 Jul 23, US Vice President Joe Biden pledged Washington's full support for Georgia a year after its war with Russia and urged Moscow to abide by a ceasefire pact and pull its troops back from two rebel regions.
(Reuters, 7/23/09)
2009 Aug 1, Authorities in the separatist Georgian region of South Ossetia said two mortar shells were fired into the territory from Georgia proper. Georgia denied the claim and suggested it was a provocation ahead of the anniversary of last year's war with Russia.
(AP, 8/1/09)
2009 Aug 8, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev hailed the Russian victory in a war with Georgia a year ago, saying the war had redrawn the map of the Caucasus for good.
(Reuters, 8/8/09)
2009 Aug 12, Russian PM Vladimir Putin made a surprise visit to Abkhazia and said Russia will spend at least 15 billion rubles ($470 million) next year to build Russian military bases in Abkhazia and tighten the separatist Georgian region's borders.
(AP, 8/12/09)
2009 Aug 31, A Georgian court sentenced a Turkish cargo ship captain to 24 years in prison for smuggling and border violations.
(AP, 9/3/09)
2009 Sep 3, Russian’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Andrei Nesterenko warned Georgia that attempts to block ships from reaching a Moscow-aligned separatist region of Georgia could end in military intervention.
(AP, 9/3/09)
2009 Sep 10, In Russia Venezuela’s President Hugo Chavez recognized the pro-Russian rebel regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent states, a rare boost to the Kremlin's campaign for their international acceptance.
(Reuters 9/10/09)
2009 Sep 15, Russian news agencies said the country's coast guard warned that it will detain Georgian ships entering the territorial waters of Abkhazia. Viktor Turfanov, the head of the coastal division of the border guards service, said that Georgia this year has intercepted more than 20 ships in Abkhazian waters.
(AP, 9/15/09)
2009 Sep 30, An EU-commissioned report said Georgia's attack on its breakaway South Ossetia region marked the start of last year's war with Russia, which retaliated with excessive force.
(AP, 9/30/09)
2009 Nov 26, Georgia’s foreign minister said his country is very worried about the possible sale of French warships to Russia and intends to press the issue of security guarantees in France.
(AP, 11/26/09)
2009 Dec 12, Abkhazia held elections. Preliminary results indicated that President Sergei Bagapsh defeated four other candidates. About 70% of the 130,000 registered voters took part in the vote. The province is also home to some 40,000 ethnic Georgians who are not eligible to vote because they don't hold Abkhazian passports. An estimated 200,000 ethnic Georgians fled Abkhazia in the 1990s.
(AP, 12/13/09)
2009 Dec 15, The tiny Pacific island of Nauru recognized the rebel Black Sea region of Abkhazia, throwing its weight behind a Russian drive to win international recognition for Georgia's breakaway territories.
(Reuters, 12/15/09)
2009 Dec 19, In Georgia a woman and her 8-year-old daughter were killed when a World War II memorial was intentionally blown up in Kutaisi. The 46-meter (150-foot) concrete and bronze war memorial stood on the proposed site for a new parliament building.
(AP, 12/19/09)
2009 Dec 22, Hansjoerg Haber, EU monitoring mission chief, said Russia has failed to fully observe an EU-brokered peace deal that ended last year's war with Georgia. He said Russia has not met an obligation to withdraw its forces to positions held before the August 2008 conflict.
(AP, 12/23/09)
2009 Dec 23, Georgia's Foreign Ministry reached a deal with Russia to open a border crossing that has been closed for three years. The two sides agreed during Swiss-brokered talks that the Verkhny Lars transit point will open in March.
(AP, 12/24/09)
2010 Feb 12, The XXI Olympic Winter Games began in Vancouver, British Columbia, with the Olympics' first-ever indoor opening ceremony. Georgian luger Nodar Kumaritashvili died in a horrific crash on a training run, casting a shadow as Vancouver opened the Winter Olympic Games with a daredevil snowboarder, an aboriginal welcome, and Wayne Gretzky lighting the cauldron.
(AP, 2/12/10)(Reuters, 2/13/10)(SFC, 2/22/10, p.A1)
2010 Feb 16, Georgia's breakaway Abkhazia region said it would allow sponsor Russia to build a military base on its soil for land troops, strengthening the region's dependence on Moscow and provoking ire from Tbilisi..
(www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE61F3JE20100216)
2010 Mar 1, Georgia and Russia reopened their only direct border crossing, more than three years after it was closed amid rising tension that erupted into war in 2008.
(AP, 3/1/10)
2010 Mar 12, Georgian church leader Metropolitan Theodor said convicts would be able to build or maintain monasteries after clerics and prosecutors struck a deal allowing criminals convicted of minor crimes to serve their sentences in the monasteries.
(AP, 3/12/10)
2010 Mar 13, In Georgia a hoax television broadcast said Russia had invaded and the president had been killed. It sparked wide anxiety in the country still traumatized by the August 2008 war in which Russian troops advanced deep into the country.
(AP, 3/15/10)
2010 May 30, Voters in Georgia chose local leaders in the first ballot since President Mikhail Saakashvili led the country into a disastrous war with neighboring Russia nearly two years ago. Candidates from President Saakashvili's party dominated local elections, according to preliminary results.
(AP, 5/30/10)(AP, 5/31/10)
2010 Jun 25, Georgian police cordoned off the central square in Gori and at night toppled the a statue of former Russian dictator George Stalin.
(Econ, 8/21/10, p.41)
2010 Jun 27, Authorities in Georgia tore down another monument to Soviet dictator and native son Josef Stalin.
(AP, 6/27/10)
2010 Jun 27, It was reported that Vienna residents have become victims of burglary in recent weeks. The Austrian interior ministry suspected that many of the burglers were from the Republic of Georgia and were supported by the Georgian Mafia. The alleged local head, a restaurant owner in Vienna, has been arrested. Police suspected the burglaries were part of plan to finance a coup against Geeorgian Pres. Saakashvili.
(SSFC, 6/27/10, p.A4)
2010 Jul 5, In Tbilisi, Georgia, US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton pledged US support for the former Soviet state.
(AP, 7/5/10)
2010 Jul 19, In Russia the Khamovniki District Court in Moscow said in a statement it has convicted Tariel Oniani (58) on extortion and abduction charges. The native of Georgia had been convicted seven times and is wanted in Spain since 2005 on money laundering charges.
(AP, 7/20/10)
2010 Aug 11, Russia said it has deployed high-precision air defense missiles in the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia, sending a defiant signal to Tblisi and the West two years after a war with Georgia.
(Reuters, 8/11/10)
2010 Nov 5, Georgia's government announced the arrests of 13 people, including four Russian citizens, who are accused of spying for Russia's armed forces. The arrests, which took place in October, were announced on the day Russia's military intelligence agency celebrates its professional holiday, Day of the Military Intelligence Officer.
(AP, 11/5/10)
2010 Dec 7, Georgia said it has arrested six people, all of them Georgian citizens, suspected of being agents for Russia and accused them of staging a series of explosions, including one outside the US Embassy in the capital.
(AP, 12/7/10)
2010 Ronald Asmus authored “A Little War That Shook the World: Georgia, Russia and the Future of the West." It covered the 2008 war in Georgia.
(Econ, 1/23/10, p.78)
2010 Thomas de Waal authored “The Caucasus: An Introduction."
(Econ, 10/23/10, p.102)
2011 Apr 1, The United Nations' highest court threw out Georgia's complaint accusing Russia and separatist militias of years of ethnic cleansing in two breakaway Georgian provinces. The court said it had no jurisdiction in the case because Russia and Georgia had never attempted to negotiate a settlement to the dispute before Georgia brought it to the court.
(AP, 4/1/11)
2011 May 25, In Georgia some 3,000 anti-government protesters demanded the resignation of Pres. Saakashvili and said they will try to block a May 26 military parade in the capital.
(AP, 5/25/11)
2011 May 26, Georgian officials went ahead with an Independence Day military parade along the central avenue where two people were killed and almost 40 injured in the violent breakup of an anti-government protest hours earlier.
(AP, 5/26/11)
2011 Jul 6, A Georgian court in the Black Sea port of Batumi convicted a Russian citizen and eight Georgians of espionage and gave them prison sentences ranging from 11 to 14 years.
(AP, 7/7/11)
2011 Jul 7, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili's personal photographer was arrested on suspicion of espionage, along with his wife and two other photographers.
(AP, 7/7/11)
2011 Jul 9, In Georgia Irakli Gedenidze, Zurab Kurtsikidze and another photographer were charged with espionage. Natia Gedenidze was released without charge. Gedenidze, the personal photographer to the Georgian president, confessed to giving another photographer, Zurab Kurtsikidze, details of the president's itinerary, motorcade route and offices for unspecified remuneration.
(AP, 7/9/11)
2011 Nov 13, Voters in Georgia's breakaway republic of South Ossetia chose a new president for the first time since Georgia and Russia fought a brief war over control of the territory in 2008. South Ossetia has been led since 2001 by Eduard Kokoiti, who has served two terms as president and is now stepping down. Among those favored to succeed him is Anatoly Bibilov, who heads South Ossetia's emergencies services and has the support of Russia's dominant pro-Kremlin party. Anatoly Bibilov and former education minister Alla Dzhioyeva each won about 25 percent of the vote forcing a runoff in two weeks.
(AP, 11/13/11)(AP, 11/14/11)
2011 Dec 31, Georgia’s defense ministry said a Georgian soldier has been killed in Afghanistan, the 11th from the ex-Soviet state to die serving alongside NATO-led forces fighting the Taliban.
(AFP, 12/31/11)
2012 Feb 13, In India and Georgia assailants targeted Israeli diplomats in near-simultaneous strikes that Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu blamed on archenemy Iran, and its Lebanese proxy, Hezbollah. The attacks wounded four people. A hitman on a rented motorbike attached a magnetic bomb to the back of an Israeli embassy car carrying the 42-year-old diplomat as she went to pick up her children from school in New Delhi. The woman, also the wife of the defense attache at the embassy, was left in a critical condition with spinal injuries and was flown to Israel for further treatment. 3 men of Iranian origin were later identified as suspects.
(AP, 2/13/12)(AFP, 3/15/12)
2012 May 26, Georgia’s Pres. Mikhail Saakashvili inaugurated the country’s new Parliament building in Kutaisi.
(SSFC, 5/27/12, p.A6)
2012 May 27, In Georgia tens of thousands of people thronged the streets of Tbilisi to show their opposition to President Mikhail Saakashvili, in the largest anti-government demonstration in three years. It was organized by Bidzina Ivanishvili, a billionaire businessman who is Georgia's richest man and leading philanthropist.
(AP, 5/27/12)
2012 Jun 30, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili named veteran Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili as the new prime minister ahead of an October parliamentary election. Under constitutional changes approved in 2010, the prime minister will gain additional powers to rival those of the president.
(AP, 7/1/12)
2012 Aug 29, At least 3 Georgian commandos and 11 militants from Dagestan were killed during an operation to free hostages held along Georgia's border with Russia.
(AP, 8/29/12)
2012 Sep 20, In Georgia street protests against the brutal abuse of prisoners escalated in Tbilisi, fueling anger against the Western-allied government and possibly boosting support for the opposition before a tight parliamentary election.
(AP, 9/20/12)
2012 Sep 29, In Georgia an estimated 100,000 opposition supporters rallied in the capital in a show of strength days before a parliamentary election that presents the toughest challenge to the future of President Mikhail Saakashvili's government since he took office in 2004.
(AP, 9/29/12)
2012 Oct 1, Georgia held parliamentary elections. The Georgian Dream party led by billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili edged out the United National Movement of Pres. Saakashvili.
(AP, 10/1/12)(SFC, 10/2/12, p.A3)
2012 Oct 2, Georgia’s President Mikhail Saakashvili, a staunch ally of the West, acknowledged defeat in parliamentary elections and called on Bidzina Ivanishvili to form a new government. That puts the tycoon on track to be prime minister, which will be Georgia's most powerful job under constructional changes next year.
(AP, 10/2/12)
2012 Nov 22, Georgia's new PM Bidzina Ivanishvili said he would move quickly to expand the Cabinet's powers, a change that would take away even more influence from the ex-Soviet nation's beleaguered pro-Western president.
(AP, 11/22/12)
2012 Dec 18, In Afghanistan a coalition soldier went missing. Afghan police found the body and turned it over to NATO forces on Dec 29. He was one of 1,560 troops serving from the former Soviet republic of Georgia. 18 Georgian soldiers have been killed since the country joined the international military operations in Afghanistan in August 2009.
(AP, 12/21/12)(AP, 12/30/12)
2012 Donald Rayfield authored “Edge of Empires: A History of Georgia."
(Econ, 11/24/12, p.87)
2013 Jan 10, Georgia opposition groups and NGOs announced that more than 1 million of Georgia's 4.6 million citizens have signed a petition calling for the resignation of Pres. Mikhail Saakashvili.
(AP, 1/20/13)
2013 Jan 13, In Georgia 190 people considered political prisoners by the new parliament walked free under an amnesty strongly opposed by Pres. Mikhail Saakashvili. More than 3,000 other prisoners who had their sentences reduced under the amnesty will be freed in the next two months.
(AP, 1/13/13)
2013 Jan 20, In Georgia more than 1,000 people protested outside of the president's residence in Tbilisi to demand that he immediately resign and hand over executive power to the speaker of parliament.
(AP, 1/20/13)
2013 Apr 19, In Georgia some 10,000 supporters of embattled pro-Western President Mikhail Saakashvili gathered for a rally testing their strength ahead of October's presidential vote.
(AP, 4/19/13)
2013 Jun 6, The Afghan governor of Kunar province alleged that an overnight NATO airstrike killed 3 civilians and wounded seven there, a claim the US-led coalition flatly denied. A civilian was killed when a bomb exploded inside a restaurant in the northern city of Sari Pul. Another 13 people were wounded. In western Farah province insurgents gunned down two tribal elders as they drove into the provincial capital. A suicide attacker drove a truck into the entrance of a camp in Helmand province in Now-e-Zad district and detonated it. 7 Georgian soldiers were killed.
(AP, 6/6/13)(AP, 6/7/13)
2013 Jun 12, Georgia said that it has closed two of its bases in Afghanistan after 10 of its soldiers were killed by militant attacks within the last four weeks. It will not reduce the number of troops serving there.
(AP, 6/12/13)
2013 Jul 3, In Georgia a Turk and a Moldovan were detained after crossing the border from Armenia in a truck with tens of millions of dollars worth of heroin hidden in a secret compartment.
(Reuters, 7/5/13)
2013 Jul 30, Georgia's culture ministry said it will restore a towering monument to Soviet dictator and native son Josef Stalin that was taken down three years ago. The restoration is part of a rollback of Pres. Saakashvili's legacy after his party lost a parliamentary vote last fall to a coalition headed by a Russia-friendly billionaire.
(AP, 7/30/13)
2013 Oct 14, French authorities detained Davit Kezerashvili, a former Georgian defence minister, wanted in his homeland on corruption charges. Kezerashvili, who also headed the financial police, was charged in January with taking a bribe of $12 million (nine million euros) to facilitate alcohol smuggling in the ex-Soviet nation.
(AFP, 10/15/13)
2013 Oct 27, Georgia voted for a new president in an election that will bring the curtain down on Mikheil Saakashvili's decade-long rule but is unlikely to end political uncertainty in the former Soviet republic. Former university rector Giorgi Margvelashvili won 62% of the vote.
(Reuters, 10/27/13)(AP, 10/28/13)
2013 Oct 28, A Georgian court convicted former defense minister Bacho Akhalaia and ordered him sent to prison, in another blow for outgoing President Mikhail Saakashvili the day after a presidential election that was won by his rival.
(AP, 10/28/13)
2013 Nov 2, Georgia's PM Bidzina Ivanishvili named Interior Minister Irakly Garibashvili (31) as his successor. Under changes to the constitution that will this month transfer many of the president's responsibilities to the prime minister, Garibashvili will become the country's most powerful politician.
(Reuters, 11/2/13)
2013 Nov 17, Georgia inaugurated philosopher and former university rector Giorgi Margvelashvili (44) as the new president. He pledged to strengthen ties with the West and maintain its commitment to NATO.
(AP, 11/17/13)
2013 Nov 29, Georgia and Moldova signed important agreements on political cooperation, reform and free trade with the EU at the summit of EU leaders in Vilnius.
(http://tinyurl.com/nq8ouy4)(Econ, 11/23/13, p.56)
2013 Dec 21, The mayor of Georgia's capital Tbilisi was suspended from office after he was charged with misspending public funds in a case he and his opposition colleagues said was a witch-hunt against supporters of former president Mikheil Saakashvili.
(Reuters, 12/22/13)
2014 Feb 17, In Georgia Vano Merabishvili, a top ally of former President Mikhail Saakashvili, was convicted of embezzlement and abuse of office and sentenced to five years in prison.
(AP, 2/17/14)
2014 May 12, A European human rights monitor urged Georgia to improve its justice system, promote tolerance and avoid the selective prosecution of officials who served former president Mikheil Saakashvili.
(Reuters, 5/12/14)
2014 Jun 27, European Union leaders signed broad trade and economic deals with non-member countries Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia.
(AP, 6/27/14)
2014 Jul 7, Eduard Shevardnadze (b.1928), a former president of Georgia and Soviet foreign minister, died in Georgia after a long struggle with illness.
(Reuters, 7/7/14)(SFC, 7/8/14, p.C4)
2014 Jul 15, In Georgia Erosi Kitsmarishvili, the founder of the Rustavi 2 TV channel, was found dead in his car with a bullet in his head.
(AP, 7/16/14)
2014 Jul 25, Georgia's interior minister said that $400 million of heroin seized earlier this month, in the country's biggest ever drugs haul, belonged to the Taliban and was headed for Europe.
(Reuters, 7/25/14)
2014 Sep 7, The United States and Georgia moved to expand their defense relationship, including the possible sale of US Black Hawk helicopters to the former Soviet bloc nation.
(AP, 9/7/14)
2014 Nov 4, Georgia’s PM Irakli Garibashvili, a Georgian Dream party member, fired defense minister Irakli Alasania, a Free Democrats member, amid an investigation into corruption in the military. European Integration Minister Aleksi Petriashvili resigned in protest. A day later Foreign Minister Maya Panjikidze and three of her deputies followed suit.
(AP, 11/5/14)
2014 Nov 13, Kakha Bendukidze (58), the author of liberal reforms that overhauled Georgia's post-Soviet economy, died in London where he was recovering from heart surgery. In May he was appointed adviser to Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko who is pushing for liberal reforms. Bendukidze had retired from public service in 2009 to invest in education and found the Free University in Tbilisi which went on to become the country's leading institution.
(AP, 11/14/14)
2014 Nov 15, In Georgia tens of thousands of people rallied in the capital to protest a planned agreement between Russia and Georgia's separatist province of Abkhazia. A proposed agreement envisages the creation of joint Russian and Abkhazian military forces.
(AP, 11/15/14)
2014 Nov 24, Russia further tightened its control over Georgia's breakaway province of Abkhazia with a new treaty envisaging closer military and economic ties, a move that has drawn outrage in Georgia.
(AP, 11/24/14)
2015 Feb 19, Georgia condemned the signing of a border agreement between its breakaway region of South Ossetia and Russia, accusing Moscow of moving closer to annexing a territory it supported in a five-day conflict in 2008.
(Reuters, 2/19/15)
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