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Herelis In Dedoplistskaro Refuse To Continue Living in Georgia

May 17, 2006

Herelis In Dedoplistskaro Refuse To Continue Living in Georgia

About 300 inhabitants of Samtatskaro, a village in the Dedoplistkaro region, signed a letter, asking the President of Azerbaijan to grant them Azeri citizenship and to give them a place to live in the Kakhi region. The authors of the letter state that the indifference of the Georgian government and chaos in the region ultimately pushed them to write it.

The population of Samtatskaro claim that representatives of the Kakheti Regional Administration, the Financial Police and the Police Department in Dedoplistskaro discriminate against them. Despite lots of protests and demands made, no one pays any attention to their plight. The bridge connecting Samtatskaro with Saingilo remains closed for no good reason. The bridge closure meant inhabitants were unable to celebrate the New Year with their relatives in Saingilo. They were also unable to visit the grave yard to remember their dead or go to pray at the Kermukhi St. George Church.

They link the closure of the bridge over the Alazani River with a disagreement between Petre Tsiskarishvili, the Presidential Representative in the Kakheti region and Marika Verulashvili, the Press-Secretary of the President.

 “The government has sacrificed us to smuggling. The truth is that the Governor, Petre Tsiskarishvili, made the Financial Police impound oil, smuggled in by Besarion Verulashvili, the brother of MP Marika Verulashvili. In response to that, Marika Verulashvili used her influence to close the bridge on the grounds that it needs to be repaired. She knew that Petre Tsiskarishvili was smuggling oil from Azerbaijan over the bridge. Everybody knows about this in Samtatskaro. We have a video tape proving the existence of corruption at the checkpoint on the border. It shows how gallons of oil are imported illegally and how the guards take bribes”, say the inhabitants of Samtatskaro. The inhabitants asked Governor Petre Tsiskaridze to reopen the bridge but he stated that he was not interested in doing so. “We have protested against the situation here several times, although unsuccessfully.  We live down on the border, so we cannot block an important motorway or protest vocally in front of the Chancellery to bother high ranking officials. We have not got the money to go to the capital”, state the residents of Samtatskaro. The residents tried several times to fix the hole in the bridge made by the Financial Police. However, all their attempts to cross the border were opposed by Special Forces.

“We asked the opposition parties as well as the government and the Public Defender of Georgia for help, but no one assisted us. We have not seen our relatives or even members of our own families for five months. We pleaded to them to allow us to cross the border on Easter, but still unsuccessfully. We could not pray at the Kurmukhi St. George Church. We are just discriminated against here. They harass us by saying that we are Turks and nomadic people and that it would be better if we just left Georgia for Azerbaijan. Dima Bochoridze, the Chief of the Police Department in Dedoplistskaro always humiliates us. We can no longer stand it. We thought about it a lot and eventually decided to go to Saingilo, to our Georgian brothers, where we will at least be able to maintain our dignity as well as our national identity. Those are the main reasons we applied to the President of Azerbaijan with the letter requesting he grant us permanent citizenship in Azerbaijan. The Georgian government gives us no other way out”, explain the angered people, with tears in their eyes.

Despite the fact that the letter to President Aliev has been ready to be sent for a long time now, the Herelis living in Samtatskaro postponed sending it. The reasons for doing so they gave as follows: “We have been living here for more than 85 years. We ran away from an oppressive Azeri government that attempted to convert us to Islam and persecuted us because of our resistance. We know that the situation there has not much changed. It is difficult to find a job for Georgian Christians. They are also forbidden from giving their children Georgian names. Nevertheless, the Azeri government does not prohibit the Ingilos living there to have relations with us. We would also like to say that the Saakashvili government is finishing the work that was started by the Georgian authorities in 1918. Because of their ‘democratic’ approach, there will not be orthodox Ingilos in Georgia any more”, exclaim the dismayed Herelis.

Although we tried hard to obtain some kind of documentation proving the bridge over the Alazani River is genuinely out of order and dangerous for people to walk or to drive across; neither the border guards nor any other official could supply us with such proof.

Arsen Maisuradze, the Samtatskaro customs officer claims that he cannot register any car because of orders from the authority. Customs officers could not show us any registration papers. The head of the press service of the Customs Department, Kakha Chabashvili, tried to assure us that everything would be OK, stating: “I will inform the authority about your problem and in ten minutes it will be solved. Customs officers do not have the right to refuse to register a car”. However, after half an hour we called him again, only this time he refused to acknowledge anything he had said earlier. “I find myself in an embarrassing situation. I understand your problem, but I cannot help you. I advise you to contact Antelidze”, said Chabashvili.

The Human Right Information and Documentation Center also attempted to conduct a telephone interview with Zurab Antelidze, although his telephone remained turned off for the entire day. However, we managed to talk to a representative of the East Customs House, a certain Gia, who refused to give his surname. “I have orders not to let anyone cross the bridge. Why do you need any documents?” Gia asked.

Later the Chief of the Financial Police in the Kakheti region, Zurab Aivazashvili, turned up along with the Special Forces. “Do not dispute or resist me. Go back to your homes, otherwise the Special Forces will do their job”, threatened Aivazashvili.

“There is complete anarchy in here. The Principle of the school, Dina Gamkharashvili, was threatened with arrest if she supports the protestors. Bochoridze was only appointed as the Chief of the Police Department because he backs the scrap-iron business. We have compromising video material on him. We do not know what else we can do. Only journalists are interested in our problems. Sozar Subari, the Public Defender should have visited us first, before going to Kurmukha”, say the inhabitants of Samtatskaro.

The Principal of the school, Dina Gamkharashvili, would not confirm being threatened; however she pointed out that the government forced her to neglect both her living and deceased relatives in Saingilo. She added that she has not seen her relatives for five months.

Gela Mtivlishvili from Kakheti 

 

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