{"id":97563,"date":"2011-05-23T11:32:48","date_gmt":"2011-05-23T06:32:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.epress.am\/?p=97563"},"modified":"2011-05-23T11:33:42","modified_gmt":"2011-05-23T06:33:42","slug":"georgia-opposition-calls-for-day-of-rage-protest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/2011\/05\/23\/georgia-opposition-calls-for-day-of-rage-protest.html","title":{"rendered":"Georgia Opposition Calls for Day of Rage Protest"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A Georgian opposition party called for a &#8220;Day of Rage&#8221; Wednesday to try to force President Mikheil Saakashvili to resign after police used teargas and rubber bullets against protesters in the capital, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/2011\/05\/22\/us-georgia-opposition-idUSTRE74L1P520110522\"><strong>Reuters reports<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The protesters, who numbered around 10,000 Saturday, accuse Saakashvili of imposing autocratic rule on the former Soviet republic that sits on energy transit routes from the Caspian to western Europe.<\/p>\n<p>Echoing language used to rally protesters in the uprisings in the Arab world, Sozar Subari, chairman of the opposition Georgian Party, said: &#8220;We are calling our supporters to come to the rally on May 25 and we call this day &#8216;Day of Rage&#8217;.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>He told a news conference Sunday the state was using its power against its own people.<\/p>\n<p>An Interior Ministry spokesperson said the police had intervened when a group of 10 protesters started smashing the windows of a police car with metal poles. Protesters had camped out in Tbilisi overnight.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Police used teargas and rubber bullets against that aggressive group of protesters &#8230; There was no intention to disperse the rally,&#8221; spokesperson Shota Utiashvili said.<\/p>\n<p>Protesters said a group of them attacked the police car because they wanted to release an activist who had been detained. Independent Maestro television reported that one woman was taken to hospital.<\/p>\n<p>By early evening, 2,000 people gathered near TV building in Tbilisi to hear about what further action was planned.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Our doors are open to other opposition political parties. We expect that more people will join our protest and this regime will be over very soon,&#8221; Nino Burjanadze, former Saakashvili ally and parliament speaker, told the crowd.<\/p>\n<p>May 25, the day of the next announced rally, falls on the day before Georgia marks its 20th anniversary of independence Thursday.<\/p>\n<p>Opponents of the pro-Western Saakashvili accuse him of monopolising power since the 2003 &#8220;Rose Revolution&#8221; that ousted the post-Soviet old guard in the Caucasus state.<\/p>\n<p>Weakened by the brief war with Russia in 2008, Saakashvili has since reasserted control, aided by an ineffective and patchy opposition.<\/p>\n<p><em>Photo: AP<\/em><\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Georgian opposition party called for a &#8220;Day of Rage&#8221; Wednesday to try to force President Mikheil Saakashvili to resign&#8230;<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":97565,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tstyn_error":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[26873,10256,11705],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97563"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=97563"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/97563\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/97565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=97563"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=97563"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/epress.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=97563"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}