BURJANADZE REACHING OUT TO OPPOSITION

C O N F I D E N T I A L TBILISI 002773

SIPDIS

SIPDIS

STATE FOR EUR/CARC

E.O. 12958: DECL: 11/07/2017
TAGS: PGOV GG
SUBJECT: BURJANADZE REACHING OUT TO OPPOSITION


Classified By: Ambassador John F. Tefft, reason 1.4(b) and (d).


1. (C) The Ambassador met privately with Nino Burjanadze,
Speaker of Parliament, on November 6. The meeting took place
at the Parliament and about 2000 demonstrators were outside
the building. Burjanadze said that she had been talking to
more moderate members of the opposition leadership, including
Kakha Kukava and Davit Usupashvili. She felt that some
progress had been made with these opponents on electoral
reform. Burjanadze said that the government is prepared to
change the "winner-take-all" system for choosing MP's from
multi-seat electoral districts to a proportional regional
system. Although she sees no possibility of changing the
makeup of the Central Electoral Commission, as sought by the
opposition, she does think that opposition representatives
can be added to regional and local election commissions. She
said that when the opposition talks about political
prisoners, they are referring to Irakli Batiashvili, jailed
for assisting the warlord Kvitsiani in the Kodori Gorge,
before the GOG retook control in 2006. She has promised
Kukava and Usupashvili she will do what she can to obtain his
release. She said that the Patriarch has asked President
Saakashvili to pardon Batiashvili, but that this requires a
formal request and process to accomplish. The Ambassador
thanked her for her efforts to resolve the political crisis
and urged her to continue.


2. (C) Burjanadze was particularly concerned about the role
played by oligarch Badri Patarkatsishvili in the protests.
Patarkatsishvili is playing for keeps, she said. She alleged
he is paying protesters 15 lari per day and doing all he can
to keep the demonstrations going. His reason is that he
knows if the opposition loses, he is finished in Georgia.
The problem Patarkatsishvili poses, Burjanadze said, is that
even if a deal can be reached with the moderate opposition,
it will not end the political uproar that serves
Patarkatsishvili's ends. It is hard for her to see a way
out, with the moderates increasingly being pushed to the side
and an overarching struggle going on between
Paatarkatsishvili and President Saakashvili.


3. (C) Later that day, in a speech to Parliament, Burjanadze
confirmed that the government is ready to negotiate on three
of the four demands of the opposition, leaving aside only the
holding of early elections. The election date was
established to avoid Russian provocations in the election
period, Burjanadze said, and she hopes at least some of the
people not protesting will understand this. She acknowledged
the social problems that motivate many of the protesters and
the population at large. She promised the government will
work to solve those problems. As an example of one of the
mistakes the government has made, she counted making
Okruashvili a minister and allowing him to remain in the
government.
TEFFT