GEORGIA: Georgian President Mr Mikhail Saakashvili vowed to unite his fractured nation yesterday and hailed its second "rose revolution" in six months, after a renegade regional leader fled to Moscow and fears of bloodshed were forgotten amid wild celebration, writes Daniel McLaughlin in Moscow
Thousands of people waved Georgian flags in Adzharia's capital, Batumi, as Mr Saakashvili washed his hands and face in the Black Sea and lauded his countrymen for ending Mr Aslan Abashidze's vice-like 14-year grip on the province.
"We have shown the world that we are a great people," said a jubilant Mr Saakashvili, the US-educated lawyer who led massive protests to oust veteran president Mr Eduard Shevardnadze last November.
"Only we could have staged two bloodless revolutions in six months," he proclaimed, hours after Mr Abashidze had heeded Tbilisi's warnings to flee or face the wrath of increasingly hostile crowds massing in Batumi.
Mr Saakashvili had given his eccentric long-time foe - whom he called "some kind of mini-Saddam" yesterday - until next Wednesday to disarm militia groups and accept Tbilisi's authority.
But Mr Abashidze responded by destroying bridges and railway tracks linking his region to the rest of Georgia, declaring a state of emergency and allegedly placing explosives on the large oil terminal at Batumi's port.
Mr Abashidze (65) left Adzharia - which his family had controlled for centuries - after talks on Wednesday with former Russian Foreign Minister Mr Igor Ivanov, the man who brokered Mr Shevardnadze's resignation.
Russian television showed Mr Abashidze's former guards firing celebratory machine-gun salvos into the air over Batumi, and revellers hauling the large leather chair from his office onto palm-lined streets and burning it.
The blue and gold flag Abashidze adopted for Adzharia had been pulled down. Even the television station that he forced to broadcast in several languages - as a sign of his global outlook and importance - was telling viewers of its new "democratic" status.
It was not clear whether Mr Abashidze would stay in Russia, but Georgia's Prosecutor General Mr Irakli Okruashvili said Mr Saakashvili's pledge not to seek his extradition still stood. "This was such a big victory for the Georgian people that the criminal prosecution of certain figures is a secondary matter," he said. "I don't think it will happen."
The peaceful resolution of the latest Georgian crisis was hailed in Tbilisi and Moscow as the fruit of improved relations between two capitals that have often been at odds since Georgia won independence from the crumbling Soviet Union. Mr Saakashvili, who discussed the crisis with the White House and Russian President Mr Vladimir Putin on Wednesday night, praised the Kremlin for playing a "key role" in avoiding bloodshed.
Moscow still has a military base in Adzharia and is keen to retain influence in a region that Washington has been trying to woo in recent years. A multi-billion dollar, US-backed pipeline is being built to take Caspian Sea oil across Georgia to western markets, and Russia is wary of losing a foothold in the strategic region.
Russian peacekeepers patrol Abkhazia and South Ossetia, two regions that escaped Tbilisi's rule in bloody and bitter civil wars in the 1990s, when Moscow covertly supported separatists in both provinces.
In the full flush of victory, Mr Saakashvili said events in Adzharia gave hope for the full reunification of Georgia. "I congratulate everyone on this victory, on the beginning of Georgia's unification," he declared.
"Ahead of us are the questions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia - we must act peacefully but with persistence." But pugnacious officials in both regions - whose independence is not internationally recognised - insisted the "rose revolution" would not be repeated there.
"South Ossetia is an independent state," said Mr Stanislav Kochiev, speaker of the province's parliament. "Our security forces are capable of protecting the sovereignty of our republic." Mr Vladislav Ardzinba, president of Abkhazia, said the region had "already proved its ability to defend the freedom and independence of Abkhazia," while his foreign minister mocked the celebratory gunfire in Adzharia.
"It's the usual Georgian pantomime," said Mr Sergei Shamba. "The Abkhaz aren't Georgians - they won't shoot into the air, but exactly where they have to."