21 February, 2013
If a deputy is a human, why aren’t we?
We spoke to a person who suffered during May 26 events, whose bloody face shown on the photo is remembered by everybody and who brought this photo to the February 8 action. Nodar Arveladze lives in the village of Dighomi and the State Flag of Georgia and that of ‘Georgian Dream’ are waving on the roof of his house. He recalled May 26 and assessed the incident at National Library on February 8:
N.A. – Discontent for Saakashvili’s authorities accumulated in me step by step. On May 26, the special squad soldiers who were dispersing the action on Rustaveli Avenue started to beat me mercilessly. At first they hit me on my head with batons, and when I covered my head with hands, they, cursing, began hitting my belly. I think they were prison executioners. After May 26, frightened, I didn’t go out of my house for a week; I didn’t dare to see a doctor. I thought that if I went to a doctor, on my way back they would deal shortly with me. They killed two men and dragged the bodies up on the roof of a shop, so why should they have mercy on me?
Q.- The whole world saw your photo. When did you take it?
A. – I don’t remember. It can be seen on the photo that I’m in shock. I thought I wouldn’t survive; I was shedding tears and blood.
Q. – I noticed you recently at the action at National Library.
A. – Yes, I was there where Ugulava shouted – let’s go, let’s go. As if he was going to a garden that is named after his father. He wanted to go into the library and what’s more, via the street where there were people who, like me, were angry at the authorities and impoverished by them. Many people whom I know left the prison and I know how inhumanly they treated them. How could they provoke this poor people? How could ‘Nationals’ come close to this poor people? They took my photo too at February 8 action… I’ll never forget my bleeding face.
Q. – Did the foreigners see you when you were beaten on May 26?
A. – Nobody came then. Now, after the authorities are changed, a lot of foreigners came, they interviewed people. Somebody’s hand hit PM Chiora Taktakishvili only once and after that, she took to her bed for three days and EU Parliamentarian Hockmark visited her; but I, an elderly man, stayed in bed for a week and nobody came to see me.
Almost the whole world saw my photo but the authorities didn’t even once get interested whether I was dead or alive. If deputy Chiora is a human, why aren’t we? Or maybe one drop of her blood was of gold? At the Library Chiora was behaving herself defiantly, she was cursing, provoking people. We, on May 26, stood peacefully but they smashed our heads and humiliated us.
We spoke to a person who suffered during May 26 events, whose bloody face shown on the photo is remembered by everybody and who brought this photo to the February 8 action. Nodar Arveladze lives in the village of Dighomi and the State Flag of Georgia and that of ‘Georgian Dream’ are waving on the roof of his house. He recalled May 26 and assessed the incident at National Library on February 8:
N.A. – Discontent for Saakashvili’s authorities accumulated in me step by step. On May 26, the special squad soldiers who were dispersing the action on Rustaveli Avenue started to beat me mercilessly. At first they hit me on my head with batons, and when I covered my head with hands, they, cursing, began hitting my belly. I think they were prison executioners. After May 26, frightened, I didn’t go out of my house for a week; I didn’t dare to see a doctor. I thought that if I went to a doctor, on my way back they would deal shortly with me. They killed two men and dragged the bodies up on the roof of a shop, so why should they have mercy on me?
Q.- The whole world saw your photo. When did you take it?
A. – I don’t remember. It can be seen on the photo that I’m in shock. I thought I wouldn’t survive; I was shedding tears and blood.
Q. – I noticed you recently at the action at National Library.
A. – Yes, I was there where Ugulava shouted – let’s go, let’s go. As if he was going to a garden that is named after his father. He wanted to go into the library and what’s more, via the street where there were people who, like me, were angry at the authorities and impoverished by them. Many people whom I know left the prison and I know how inhumanly they treated them. How could they provoke this poor people? How could ‘Nationals’ come close to this poor people? They took my photo too at February 8 action… I’ll never forget my bleeding face.
Q. – Did the foreigners see you when you were beaten on May 26?
A. – Nobody came then. Now, after the authorities are changed, a lot of foreigners came, they interviewed people. Somebody’s hand hit PM Chiora Taktakishvili only once and after that, she took to her bed for three days and EU Parliamentarian Hockmark visited her; but I, an elderly man, stayed in bed for a week and nobody came to see me.
Almost the whole world saw my photo but the authorities didn’t even once get interested whether I was dead or alive. If deputy Chiora is a human, why aren’t we? Or maybe one drop of her blood was of gold? At the Library Chiora was behaving herself defiantly, she was cursing, provoking people. We, on May 26, stood peacefully but they smashed our heads and humiliated us.