DFWatch staff 
TBILISI, DFWatch–Saakashvili’s National Movement is meeting resistance in its efforts to play the crime card in the election campaign.
“No-one should be led by Saakashvili to try to score political points in my child’s name,” says Khatuna Kortava, aunt of Levan Kortava,
TBILISI, DFWatch–On Wednesday, it seemed that a minaret which was taken down, ostensibly for tax audit purposes, would be put back up.
Archil Khabadze, head of government in the Adjara region, said the minaret in Chela would be rebuilt on Thursday.
Muslims had come
TBILISI, DFWatch–President Mikheil Saakashvili called Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili a “zoo director” and compared persons released in an amnesty to animals.
Saakashvili said he usually gets a warm welcome in Batumi, and was surprised when there was a demonstration
TBILISI, DFWatch–The exiled Saakashvili ally Dimitry Shashkin returned to Georgia on Wednesday to answer questions about the abuse in the prisons.
Shashkin was among many officials in the former regime who fled the country after the National Movement’s election
TBILISI, DFWatch–Three Georgians were released on Wednesday by Russian soldiers in South Ossetia, a Georgian breakaway region.
Irakli Merebashvili, and the couple Nana Vanishvili, Alexandre Tsertsvadze and their teenage child were detained on August 22 in the village
TBILISI, DFWatch–429 prisoners were released on Wednesday in connection with the Georgian religious holiday Mariamoba.
August 28, Georgia celebrates the assumption of Mary, known as Mariamoba. In connection with the holiday, the president customarily pardons
TBILISI, DFWatch–All the people detained while protesting against the dismantling of a minaret at a Mosque in the village Chela, in southern Georgia, have now been released.
Meanwhile, the protests continue in the village and support rallies are held in the capital
TBILISI, DFWatch–Police in Georgia on Tuesday detained the head of the local government in Adigeni in the south of the country, where a minaret of mosque was recently dismantled.
Gamgebeli Simon Parunashvili, who is member of the National Movement, is charged with
TBILISI, DFWatch–President Mikheil Saakashvili has asked the Ivanishvili government for a dialogue to discuss how to establish ‘civil peace’ after the dismantling of a minaret, but the government rejected the idea, and the vice premier said there have never been
TBILISI, DFWatch–Georgia may take part in UN-led peacekeeping operations. This is clear after a visit to the U.S. by Defense Minister Irakli Alasania.
During the visit, Alasania and Irakli Dzneladze, head of Joint Staff of Georgia’s armed forces, met with Edmond