twenty years ago in the largest country in the. two cases of. what had been trying. to teach began a journey. where did it take them. more news today violence is once again flared up. these are the images cold world has been seeing from the streets of canada. china operations to rule the day.

four thirty am in moscow these are your r.t. headlines inza votes for drastic spending cuts and a tax hike to secure another e.u. bailout despite days of clashes between police and protesters outside the greek parliament a forty eight hour general strikes underway with demonstrators remaining on the streets of the capital tonight dozens have reportedly been injured many others detained as police battle to keep activists from reaching the parliament building. as pressure mounts on syrian president assad we investigate intelligence reports that missiles are being moved from the country under the control of the lebanese militant group hezbollah syria has a large network of allies and supporters analysts say the collapse of the government in damascus could have catastrophic implications for the region. more than a thousand people injured in clashes with police in the egyptian capital cairo demonstrators

are demanding the prosecution of security forces that are accused of brutality during the mass uprising that led to the lead to february's ousting of president hosni mubarak is also anger at the slow pace of reforms following the revolution. next latest in our series of reports on life in the former soviet republics twenty years after the collapse of the u.s.s.r. stay with us here on r.t. . nine hundred ninety one george are achieved independence from the u.s.s.r. . before a violent standoff with the rapidly disintegrating soviet empire. we did get independence but it resulted in much blood in the structure. of the civil war broke out in georgia to susie came sovereignty to this day the nation has been unable to overcome its aftermath the country's infrastructure is in ruins tens of thousands of people fled the country in the time of the soviet union georgia was one of the

wealthiest republics today one third of the population lives below the poverty line twenty years have passed but people here enjoy less freedom than they did during the soviet period. back in one thousand nine hundred eight. really was just a student he joined a mass trying to strike outside government headquarters at that time the country was still cooled the georgian soviet socialist republic. that hunger strike which lasted eight or nine days. of liberation i often sat on the steps with my friends. the number of protesters good day by day. then a young historian lend his support to the coolers. that independence was my watchword

at that time i didn't miss a single public action all rally. in april. celss of people gathered in tbilisi for an open ended rally outside government headquarters they wanted independence for the republican georgia viet gamsakhurdia leader of a nationalist movement was the speaker who made the most extremist remarks in an intensely dramatic speech. in the early hours of april ninth the soviet government dispatched armored vehicles and soldiers against peaceful demonstrators sixteen people died and hundreds were injured. a mathematician and would be magnet of georgia was lucky enough to evade even injury. we were in too much of a hurry we were trying to study history to help move it forward happened then had to happen but of course the thought the georgian might become independent is nine

hundred ninety one never crossed my mind back in the late one nine hundred eighty s. . the spirit of the became the first president of a sovereign georgia in april nine hundred ninety one after an election campaign where independence was the catchphrase but as soon as he came to power he didn't expect that independence multo georgian autonomous regions of south ossetia. into ethnic conflicts began. georgia responded by sending troops to south ossetia. because. people were once neighbors became bitter enemies thousands of refugees fled to georgia. as far as i know years ago this building was meant to be a hospital. but there is no hospital and now. the building is

used as a shelter for refugees. thousands of the georgians who have left since the early one nine hundred ninety s. still live in makeshift shelters they have lost everything homes jobs and even the hope to return to their home country georgians alike have gone through a lot of suffering such as the horrors of war and loss of loved ones and yet they don't blame one another for that conflict. well you know there is nobility sions have toned people apart and there was no enmity between individuals my neighbor said to me what am i supposed to do one of my sons in law is in a pansy and that means my grandsons are peasants aren't they. and other daughter is married to a georgian so her children are georgians do i need to tell my grandsons apart what am i supposed to do in this situation the. bitter fighting between georgia's standing army and abkhazia and insurgents cost thousands of lives on both sides.

tomorrow is not because young woman four of her five sons died in the war the youngest was seventeen when he volunteered to fight his grave is close to his father's. you have an opinion that i would do like to have the word war confined to the history books that i want nobody to ever arteries again i wanted to be forgotten altogether. tomorrow and a husband wanted the new house to have enough room for all that children and their future families but now it's almost uninhabited one of the rooms houses a memorial museum to the family it features the son's medals they received and the letters they sent from the front line to more especially treasures objects made by her children i want in this is the root of a pine tree they made

a heart out of it. my second son enjoyed making such things she died in a battle on the same day as my youngest son. len many georgian opposition parties and even spearhead gamsakhurdia as former associates demonstrated that discontent with the rule georgian intellectuals sent numerous letters to the president asking him to come to his senses. responded by imposing censorship. all of them and it was a nine hundred ninety one law even denied registration for all political parties it was indorsed by people who had served terms in soviet prisons and campaigned for georgia's freedom and independence. most people did while they themselves had been opposed to. a train to become a mathematician in the early one nine hundred ninety s.

he left university and went into business his elder brother chose the career of an actor today he is very popular in georgia i his soul is in short films have an uncanny bearing on the country's present day situation. i had no desire to get involved in the war in a cause here in such a war where brothers were killing brothers so i decided to stay away from georgia for a time there were. those who were displeased with the first president gathered to openly demand his resignation the nine hundred ninety two standoff between

protesters and the regime erupted into street fighting involving all tillery in tanks. gamsakhurdia had to flee. the country. does it with george's second president the experience political heavyweight. perestroika soon after he took office he lifted the opposition political parties and allowed independent media. after i went into business in one thousand nine hundred ninety three i launched a project called. over ten years i turned a small studio in the provincial town of into a leading national broadcaster. to t.v. channel rushed at the country's new leaders including president eduard shevardnadze and was focused on runaway corruption. corruption in the economic sphere was enormous off the shevardnadze came to power but on the other hand businessmen

learned new skills in tune with modern times and a real market economy took shape true there was pervasive corruption from top to bottom but there was also freedom of speech and individual liberty the sort of quagmire that we have now didn't exist then. independent t.v. channel two became a so-called platform for the opposition and had great political weight but president shevardnadze who declared freedom of speech as a principle made no attempt to sway the channels editorial policy. the worst of the two t.v. channel and other georgian media paved the way for radical political transformations november two thousand and three saw a bloodless coup in georgia the rose revolution. really a young and ambitious person came to power. it was a bus when i attended my resignation of my own free will to prevent bloodshed when

they burst into the house of parliament i went out into the street to meet my followers. any order coming from me is the law for the army no doubt the army would have defeated them only ofter a bloodbath i make no distinction between the two sons all of them and georgian citizens. believe had promised to beat corruption and lead the nation to prosperity however it was the press that was the first victim of his law and order. world to. bring you the latest in science and technology from around russia. we've got the future covered.

if. the being a. bad. thing i took your thoughts or your birthday out. there this street still keeps its secrets of the mountain to reveal the shooting of the soviet files on the ati. is easy to get. you.

to. see. as soon as i really took power he attempted to take control of the editorial policy of the country's leading independent t.v. channel earth to its own skits mellish really realize that his window of opportunity was quite narrow. the authorities ambition to take control of the channel it goes back to two thousand and four the new system of government seemed to be weak we thought we needed to build a viable state first and then take care of the rest it was because of our book as it turned out the regime's aim was to take control of the channels i think the blame for what i did because i gave away. i didn't want to rock the boat. as

about the same time george's media was going out of its way to report on mikhail saakashvili as police reforms on face value the changes look quite impressive petty crime had been stamped out people now felt more secure on the streets of the towns of the us traffic patrols that stopped taking bribes. to just exist through the country's traffic police are totally free from corruption. but you can get your license within a day after pain right through official channels instead of flying in somebody spock it's. for many years nino burjanadze was speaker of the country's parliament and one of mikail billie's closest associates in two thousand and eight she resigned from the post of parliamentary speaker and founded an opposition party . in the us the reason very serious problem by its corruption in the elite

it has grown even larger compared to what it was like in the last years of shevardnadze through when everybody was talking about corruption in georgia's government. there. was always an opposition moderate to saakashvili as the owner of a major medical insurance company he knows all too well the meaning of so-called elite corruption. as soon as second civilian his inner circle came to how they set about collecting taxes and so-called dirty money which was that they sent very many people to prison it was business men as well as former officials among them people realize they had better pay off as much as they were expected to pay they sold the property they ceded their shares in businesses to members of saakashvili is party prosecutor's office and the interior ministry kept a close eye on the deals this. pent up discontent fun erupted into a mass rally in november two thousand and seven according to various estimates

fifty to one hundred thousand opposition supporters came to the house of parliament in tbilisi. for several days they kept around the clock vigil on nov seventh police barlinnie dispersed the peaceful rally hundreds of demonstrators were injured police would take us. police beat up people lying on the ground with battens. the only remaining independent t.v. channel showed these events in tbilisi to a nationwide audience it was late shut down while it was on the air with a regular news bulletin. did the meeting of the team and the mixing settle by closing the channels the government is violating the constitution this means that this is a dictatorship regime misdemeanors coming into the studio i want to say thank you i hear shots in the control room you know which i hope our employees won't be injured

here are our guests. the independent journalist of a coma he'd say became popular in georgia in the mid one nine hundred ninety s. he enjoys all. king unpleasant questions no matter who is in power come a he says now in hiding in switzerland his latest piece of investigative journalism concerns the old conflict between georgia and south the city in two thousand and eight. when up on this one i know of no journalist who would not have wanted to go to scandal to get the facts. but all the state media summed up my work there is high treason to the self-proclaimed republic of south a setia hasn't been under george's direct rule since nine hundred ninety two michel psychist really repeated many times that the republic had to return to georgia and he promised to settle the situation through diplomacy. going to the front we don't

need a war and their pals in an ascension people don't need one either there is a force that wants the defeat of the georgian and at has an assyrian people are i promise they won't let it happen on the much. but in the early hours of august the altering repeated and showed symbolic from georgian territory in the morning troops were sent into the republic. it was the start of a military operation described by saakashvili of the introduction of constitutional order in the turret tree south to set up. if the i was woken up by a lot of noise everything was roaring and shaking women outside was screaming and crying it was as if all of us had landed in hell after a volcanic eruption and everybody stayed awake throughout the night the noise never died down not even for a second. artist

color man could have to lodz their lives in an old house on the outskirts of the village of got a cool fifteen kilometers from the border with south to say. he is not interested in politics and doesn't know the first thing about international relations but his from around the world flock to his home to display their works one of the projects was called liquid it was to have been implemented jointly with russian artists in late september two thousand and eight. the georgian word for this place is near it isn't places like this that georgians traditionally make wine artists of different nationalities are going to contribute to georgian traditions they will get in to press grapes with their feet just as it was done in the old days a year later we will get a jointly made product a wine brand called liquid aunt. in the spring of two

thousand and eight karen began building a pavilion for the exhibition he was still constructing it in august when another war broke out between south a set here in georgia. i went on building the pavilion during the war fighting was going on right behind the mountain fifteen kilometers from here i saw the flashes and heard the bombings i also saw helicopters up in the air. hostilities came to an end nine days later when russia sent troops into south a setia to separate the warring parties georgia subsequently broke off diplomatic relations with russia. when vest turn come a he was working on

a film about the georgian city and conflict he made arrangements for an interview with european human rights campaigners to be held in geneva shortly before he was due to go the journalist received a tip off that he had better stay in switzerland. all sorts of problems cropped up after my return from senegal because i won't talk about them because my words may get in the way of the investigation. i can only tell you that i received open threats and heard something so humiliating that i contributed. no comma he'd say lives in a swiss hostel for political refugees friends keep him abreast of events by phone. i hear you going to switzerland. don't go to town with us right in october by that time you must complete all formalities concerning immigration chances are i myself will return home by then there is a regime change. did you say regime change yes why not that's

a possibility. although we hope so. vegetating and so is us who body have been friends ever since they went to school together when parliament appointed to the post of he gave his friend a job in his office when his first term of office came to an end parliament annoyed him a second term now the journalist is in hiding in a foreign country the ex is unemployed it would be a while if i praise the authorities i would have been elected. they would even have changed the law to let me for ten times. in the last presidential election live and say it was officially the runner up his party's headquarters supplied the oh a c e commission with evidence documenting schools a regularities some of them made public in the commission's conclusions but the final report ultimately described the election as valid.

is a famous georgian musician in protest against the regime he decided to barricade himself in a television studio made up to look like a prison cell for several months he stayed in the room with four t.v. cameras tracking his every move. today georgia means prison all of georgia is a prison but the georgian people made a mistake by electing what i call an illegitimate person. politician sportsman and all visited his cell to support the musician. heads the leading opposition party he visited his brother three times during his self-imposed imprisonment.

how are you so so what are you i get loads of letters to possibles are full of them already the guys are nuts they've made a saint out of me. his one man prison show began as eleven pm and last until morning the following day the whole country would discuss what had been said during the night after two months of self confinement do you only get such a lot they took time out for a public appearance at the b.b.c. stadium leaving a cage in the midst of the show was a strikingly symbolic act the people who had filled the stadium and adjacent roads turned guilty could try to lead to show into what amounted to a protest rally. and they put two thousand and nine leaders of all opposition parties as their followers to take to the streets in tbilisi. just felt get out second street get out

saakashvili get down gets out move you know it all position has never said really is our president we call him a de facto rather than does your president. today the former participants in the rallies for georgia's independence have united into a party. that our aim is to create a party that is without parallel and georgian history it should be a party based on genuine national values shared by most people in our country. the leader of the new party is live. a former magnus in the wine industry he has the support of its mellish really the architect of the country's leading television company and george's last ambassador to russia the party's third leader is a historian who has won the nation's affection as an honest man. george's rulers in recent years have been so different the one would be hard put to say

which of them is fully to blame for the present day situation there are no independent courts of law democratic institutions are not allowed to develop and the country's people are intimidated in the autumn of two thousand and eight a group of friends met in old warehouses turned into studios in moscow they were artists who are keen to participate in an international project that was to take place in the home of. the bull this is a remarkably exquisite european style project but i think we need to make slight changes to emphasize a note of sorrow in it merrymaking is out of place after what happened you don't do that at a funeral the funeral still goes on. the russian artists didn't visit their georgian friends in either two thousand and eight or later they have decided against going to georgia for the time be for they do not travel in politics they believe that in their beautiful country of long traditions funerals

will give way to weddings and the street protests else did by projects concerts and theatre festivals.