At a ceremony marking 70th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, Georgian PM Irakli Garibashvili said that what makes this day special is that this war was won by a Georgian, referring to the Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.
“What is the most important is that this war was won by a Georgian and that’s why it is even more special,” PM Garibashvili told journalists in Park of Vake in Tbilisi on May 9, where memorial of the Unknown Soldier is located and where every year on this day Georgian WWII veterans gather to mark the Victory Day.
“It’s a great day today – 70th anniversary of victory over huge evil,” he said in a speech at the event. “335,000 Georgians lost their lives in this war. I pay tribute to their memory.”
As of now there are about 1,800 World War II veterans in Georgia. This year the government allocated GEL 1,000 for each veteran as one-time allowance on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the end of the WWII.
President Giorgi Margvelashvili, government members and other officials laid a wreath at the memorial of the Unknown Soldier on May 9.
Also on May 9 in the Park of Vake police detained at least five activists, who confronted several people for wearing Georgievsky ribbons – orange and black striped St. George ribbons of the Russian military.
There were reports in recent days that members from pro-Putin biker group the Night Wolves were intending to attend the May 9 ceremony in Tbilisi. Interior Minister, Vakhtang Gomelauri, told journalists in the Park of Vake on Saturday that Russian bikers arrived in Georgia, but were told not to appear at the venue of ceremonies on their motorcycles and not to wear Georgievsky ribbons in order to avoid confrontation. A group of Georgian bikers were gathered at the Park of Vake on May 9; they were saying that they would not have allowed Russian bikers to show off their Russian symbols.
Overnight on May 9 paint was thrown at motorcycles of several Russian citizens in Tbilisi; but owners of the motorcycles told Georgian television stations that they were Russian tourists, who had nothing to do either with the Night Wolves or with the May 9 events.
Meanwhile in Gori, hometown of Stalin in Georgia’s Shida Kartli region, members of Communist party, Stalinist organizations and various pro-Russian groups held a rally for couple of hours on May 9. Waving Soviet red flags, demonstrators marked the Victory Day and also called for restoration of a huge Stalin statue, which was removed from the center of Gori in 2010. Some demonstrators were holding banners reading: “Yankee Go Home”; “We don’t Believe in EU’s Fairy Tales”; “Georgia for Eurasian Union”.
This post is also available in: ქართული (Georgian) Русский (Russian)