Former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili has criticized the country’s fifth president, Salome Zourabichvili. The statement was prompted by her recent remarks. Saakashvili believes that Zourabichvili “turned out to be the worst foreign minister Georgia has ever had.”
“Yesterday, Salome Zourabichvili once again repeated regarding me: ‘No and never!’ Who is this woman? She had a successful diplomatic career in France. After the revolution, I was captivated by the idea of bringing back representatives of our diaspora to their homeland and involving them in governing the state, just as the Baltic states did.
Zourabichvili had a decent background and a wonderful mother. To this day, I respect her brother, Otar Zourabichvili. Salome’s husband, Janri Kashia, was a friend of my mother and my uncle. Therefore, in 2004, I really liked the idea of appointing her as foreign minister to replace the Soviet relic Tedo Japaridze.
At the time, I was chasing a dream. But after this personnel decision, the dream turned into a bitter reality. Salome turned out to be the worst foreign minister Georgia has ever had…
From the very first days, she completely neglected the organizational work of the ministry. During my state visits, she would unexpectedly leave the delegation, turn off her phone, and disappear for several days. She fatally damaged relations with our most important neighbors—Turkey and Azerbaijan. The then-President of Turkey, Abdullah Gül, personally demanded her removal from Turkish affairs, and Zourabichvili herself was officially banned from entering Turkey during that period.
Highly dubious favorites of hers, who had nothing to do with professionalism, appeared in the ministry’s leadership. Against this background, a virtual rebellion against Salome began in parliament, and I dismissed her. When I informed her of my decision, she said: ‘Dissolve parliament immediately, call elections, and make me prime minister.’ I just laughed. That is how we parted ways back then.
After that, she immediately engaged in opposition activities. But this was no ordinary opposition; it was genuine anti-state and subversive activity.
In 2007, Russian Su-24 bombers bombed a Buk-M1 anti-aircraft missile system purchased from Ukraine near the village of Tsitelubani near Gori. Zourabichvili immediately called a press conference and claimed that, in reality, a Georgian aircraft had been repainted on my orders and had allegedly bombed our own positions to frame Russia. She acted exactly like Russian Defense Minister Pavel Grachev did in 1993, when he accused Georgians of bombing Sukhumi.
After 2008, her collaborationism became fully apparent. She published materials about how I had allegedly bombed ‘sleeping Tskhinvali’ and should be convicted for it. Furthermore, she wrote the book La tragédie géorgienne, which Russia presented to the Hague Court as evidence of war crimes allegedly committed by me and the Georgian military.
Therefore, I am convinced: Russia could not have found a better presidential candidate. What could be better for them than a former French ambassador accusing Georgia of starting the war? That is precisely why, in my opinion, Ivanishvili was instructed to bring her to power.
The 2018 elections were crudely rigged, using violence and bribery. For the sake of Zourabichvili’s election, in particular, Iya Kerzaia, a school principal from Zugdidi, was driven to her death; she was intimidated and blackmailed on Salome’s behalf, and her heart could not take it.
During her presidency, Zourabichvili met with Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Kyiv and discussed only one issue—my detention and transfer to Georgia. Zelenskyy himself, whose Reform Council I chaired, told me about this personally. According to him, the Ukrainian president flatly refused her back then. Later, after the war began, when Zourabichvili tried several times to visit Kyiv and take a photo with Zelenskyy, the response from his administration was always the same: ‘We will not let her engage in PR. If she wants to come, she must first free Saakashvili.’ Throughout recent years, Zourabichvili has detailed my alleged crimes in interviews with Western TV channels, explaining why I must remain in prison.
Her role during the mass protests was also highly negative. She repeatedly stopped people who were ready to change the regime. At the same time, it was a major mistake by a section of the opposition to declare Salome the only legitimate authority, because a president who came to power through fraud was never legitimate in the first place.
Instead of apologizing for participating in the destruction of the country, Salome Zourabichvili continues to brazenly claim that she was right about everything. Such people disgust me even more than Ivanishvili. I am writing all this because we must learn to distinguish good from bad, to call an enemy an enemy, and a friend a friend. Otherwise, we will endlessly walk in circles,” Mikheil Saakashvili wrote.
