Europe's need for stable deliveries of Russian gas will loom large at the summit

The EU and Russia, led by President Dmitry Medvedev, were scheduled to discuss energy security. The summit will approve the setting up of an early warning mechanism to prevent another gas crisis like last winter’s. Also the subject of discussion will be the climate change, trade and human rights at their biannual summit in Stockholm, the Swedish capital. Relations between the two hit a low over the past year after Russia’s war with Georgia as well as Moscow’s sudden decision in January to cease natural gas deliveries because of a dispute with Ukraine, leaving millions of EU citizens in the cold.

Unlike in the previous meeting six months ago in Moscow, which ended without tangible success, this time the two sides appear determined to mend relations.

The European Union is hoping to convince Russia to make a stronger commitment to reducing greenhouse gas emissions as the U.N. climate change conference in Copenhagen approaches in December.

Tina Khidasheli, member of “republican party” made an announcement that protest will continued all day long in two different places: in front of the Parliament and near the President’s administration at 5 p.m.

Kakha Kukava, representative of Conservatories party made an announcement that today from 5 p.m.  Protesters will move to the President’s administration and continue demonstration for 24 hour until Saakashvili is not resign. And other participants of the protest will daily gather in front of parliament.

Today for the first time participants of the protest are not going to held a protest by the Public Broadcaster.

At 11 a.m., President Mikheil Saakashvili stood next to the opposition leader Levan Gachechiladze at a prayer held by Catholicos-Patriarch of all Georgia Ilia II, to commemorate the 20 Georgians shot and killed for protesting against the Soviets. Gachechiladze even helped to light a candle held by Davit Bakradze, the head of Parliament and prominent member of Saakashvili’s National Movement. April 9 is a national holiday for Georgians to commemorate the tragic events.

The morning meeting set the tone for Thursday’s protests, which were more civil than disobedient. With large but orderly marches, leading to about 55,000 protesters converging upon Parliament, and a measured government response with not even one can of tear gas fired, the day ended as it had begun: with Saakashvili still president, and the opposition still demanding his resignation.

More tension may come today, when demonstration leaders have directed protesters to block parliament, the president’s administration building and other “main building” entrances if he doesn’t resign by 4 p.m.

Both sides took credit for the peaceful first day protests. According to opposition leaders the peace lasted during the day because the protestors were “well organized and in a nonviolent mood,” said Zviad Dzidziguri, a prominent member of the Conservative Party. Government officials maintained the fact that the police was restrained and instructed not to obstruct any peaceful protests.

Some Georgian experts are saying that much depends on how long each side can maintain the goodwill.

“I don’t think that Government is concerned because of the protest yet. Everything depends on the development of the process. If the number of protesters will rise, than the government will think about compromise, if no they will continue pretending that nothing important has happened,”said Vladimer Papava, a Professor of Economics and a Senior Fellow of the Georgian Foundation for Strategic and International Studies.

Another political scientist, Soso Tsiskarishvili, who ran Georgia’s External Economic Relationships Department under ex-President Eduard Shevardnadze, adding:

“The side which will use violence first will lose.”

The day started uncharacteristically early for Georgia: at 5 a.m. about 60 people gathered in front of parliament to commemorate national holiday. Most of these people were going to participate in opposition protests later, but for the moment, they were lighting candles and laying flowers at a memorial in front of Parliament.

After meeting together in prayer, opposition leaders split off in four different places, meeting their supporters at 12 p.m. Gachechiladze and the Alliance for Georgia party gathered in front of the Georgian Public Broadcaster building. Nino Burjanadze’s party, Democratic Movement – United Georgia, together with the youth movement branding themselves April 9 Headquarters, started from Tbilisi State University. National Forum and their supporters moved from Dinamo Stadium, while the Avlabari Metro station was the starting place for the Conservative party and Movement for United Georgia.

At about 2:30 p.m. all of the protesters met in front of the parliament, joined by tens of thousands of others. Poet Dato Magradze read the statement written by the opposition saying that this is the last chance for the government and that the protesters will not leave until their main demand – resignation of President – will be fulfilled.

Almost all leaders of oppositional parties addressed protesters with textbook speeches promising few concrete future actions. The appearance of Nino Burjanadze, former Saakashvili administration anchor turned opposition, was met by whistles and boos. She apologized to the crowd for not being able to protect them during the protest of November 7, 2007.

“Nino it’s too late,” shouted some protestors. Many are angry that Burjanadze didn’t do more to curb Saakashvili over the past four years. They also don’t trust her connections, including her father, a flour mogul, and her husband, a high ranking official during former President Eduard Schevardnadze’s time.

About 4 p.m. part of protesters an oppositional leader’s decided to go back to the building of the Public Broadcaster to complain about not showing complete coverage of demonstrations. Read more on this story here: www.ketiebanoidze.wordpress.com

Couple of hundred protesters stayed in front who ran Georgia’s External Economic Relationships Department under ex-President Eduard Shevardnadze of the Parliament building during the night and during the day on Friday. Read more here: www.radiobedniereba.wordpress.com

-By Lika Kasradze, Ia Gavasheli and Natalie Nozadze

Besalia's party, shown with a Movement for a United Georgia banner here, march towards parliament on Thursday, April 9. PHOTO BY IA GAVASHELI.

Eka Beselia, leader of the Movement for United Georgia party, called for acts of civil disobedience if Georgian President Mikhail Sakashvili does not resign. Beselia was among the first speakers to address the large demonstration gathered in front of parliament.

Beselia appealed for a peaceful protest, but said that the opposition would have no choice but to conduct disruptive actions if their demands were not met.

In an earlier speech former Speaker Nino Burjanadze apologized for her prior role in the government amid jeering from the crowd.

Now, for about two years, she has been working at a private oncological clinic, Medulla. It was not easy to get a job in a time when there is a lot of unemployment in Georgia, but she considers that after studying for about 10 years and getting experience in her field, she was worthy of it.
Gogishvili adores her profession even though her job is very difficult, physically and psychologically. Her working day begins at 9:30 a.m. and no one knows exactly when it will finish. She is often busy on weekends as well. But that is not the great difficulty of her job.

The main complication is that her patients are mortal. Because Gogishvili is an oncologist and cancer is an incurable illness, in many cases, death is unavoidable.

“I am glad that in my life I have the ability to help sick people, it is a great obligation and responsibility for me and I do it with great pleasure. But I am sorry that in many cases I can only prolong my patient’s lives, not cure them,” she said. Gogishvili tries to do everything to help her patients, to mitigate their pain and make their last months or days easier.
“Maybe I have the most awful job in the world, but it is one of the most important jobs as well,” she said.

Every day she meets people with the worst diseases and because of her experience, she can help them, not only as a doctor, but as a friend, perhaps even more then their real friends and relatives, who are usually under stress.

Despite the difficulties connected with being a doctor, the profession is so important to her that Gogishvili has no idea what she would do if she were not a doctor.
But she has another profession as well: She is a specialist of foreign languages and if she were not a doctor, she would probably be a pedagogue.

 

Measles and rubella virus vaccination in Georgia showed low percent of coverage.

Till November 2 mass immunization campaign was to be held in Georgia. Everyone of age 6 to 27 should have been immunized against measles and rubella. Posters on the walls of Tbilisi polyclinics were warning people that only by vaccination was possible to avoid these viruses. “Vaccine is safe, vaccination is free”, they stated.

As the Public Relations officer of the Ministry of Labour, Health and Social Affairs Tamar Manjavidze said, the mass immunization campaign aimed to cover the entire country. She declared that it was international decision, planned campaign, which takes place all over the world. “If we belong to the region of Europe we must settle the questions of health in a same way as Europe”, she said.

The campaign was implemented by the National Center of Disease Control with overall coordination of the Ministry of Labour, Health and Social Affairs.

United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNISEF) was one of the supporting organizations of the campaign. According to Tamar Ugulava, head of UNISEF’s health programs, the Georgian government, World Health Organization, UNISEF and Georgian Red Cross signed a memorandum, under which Georgia joined the European countries in the effort of eradication of measles and rubella diseases for 2009-2010 years.

By Ugulava’s information, Ministry of Health and its subordinate National Centre of Disease Control elaborated a campaign action plan. Funds were mobilized, target age group defined by the help of consultants. According to Ugulava, said in 2004-05 years in Georgia 9 people died by these viruses, “these facts were studied in advance and based on that was defined how many people in Georgia needed vaccination, was calculated necessary amount of vaccines, everything was planned in details.”

UNICEF has supported the Government campaign by supplying vaccines, cold and safety boxes used for keeping the vaccine, and led communication and social mobilization campaign to inform the society about the campaign. UNICEF had also conducted a number of seminars for media to raise their awareness about the importance of campaign.

Minister of Health Alexander Kvitashvili said, that “In total 1922 vaccination centers and mobile immunization teams were set up and 4,000 skilled immunization workers were re-trained for the campaign, a million doses of measles and rubella vaccines have been purchased and delivered all across the country,” according to the website of UNISEF.

As the director of National Centre of Disease Control Paata Imnadze said, there was held vaccination against measles, rubella and mumps last year, but it was a planned vaccination. The children of age 1 to 5 were inoculated. By his information, the current campaign does not refer to people under the age 6 and aims to stop an outbreak of measles and rubella expected in 2010.

By the information of Ketevan Kintsurashvili, epidemiologist of Iashvili Children’s Hospital, however the vaccine is same, children who were immunized last year and turned 6 this year, must be vaccinated again during this campaign. “Noside-effects are expected while injecting twice and additional vaccination forms stronger immunity. So, we will have more guarantee to have mass immunized stratum in the country,” she said.

Vaccination started on October 20. Target group consisted of 1 200 000 people. The Indian medicine was used for the vaccination against measles and rubella. The official site of National Centre of Disease Control was publishing the information on their website about the course of vaccination. According to the website, in the first few days of campaign had the highest activity. In three days 18% of total amount were vaccinated, while by the end of October this number grew only to 31%.

Public Relations officer of the Ministry of Health declared that the reason of decreased activity became the information spreaded by televisions two-three days after starting the vaccination. Televisions broadcasted that the facts of worsening children’s conditions, were allegedly caused by vaccination. Tamar Manjavidze said that this information was misleading, since the symptoms that were named – giddiness, tremble, headache, are the post-vaccine complications. As she explains this reaction exposes in 5-15% of vaccinated people. “From 5 to 15% showing is normal, 330 000 people were vaccinated and the post-vaccine complications exposed only in 0,11%,” she says.  

In children’s polyclinic #20 doctor-immunologist Diana Lashkhia was leading the immunization campaign. As she said, four brigades were working there, three of them in schools and kindergartens. Daily doses of preparation were distributed from polyclinic, where they are kept safely in conformable temperature. “6 000 children should be vaccinated and about 3 000 were immunized in this polyclinic. There were some easy cases of post-vaccine complications, only one child was taken in hospital for two hours,” said Diana Lashkhia.

Tamar Ugulava named the same reason causing the low activity of people in campaign. “Negative information coming from television caused panic in population. Believe me, no single child needed to be reanimated, only easy symptoms were appearing,” she said.

Teona Korchilava, living in Samtredia region, vaccinated both of her children. As she said after injection her 15-year-old son Giga became ill and although not hospitalized, he was lying in bed with strong headache and high temperature for three days. “I was very scared, Giga was too weak. Doctor told us that it was normal symptoms displaying in some cases after injection, but it was not a big relief. I have been vaccinating my children since childhood and there have never been such occasion,” said Korchilava.

Nino Sikharulidze from Tbilisi didn’t vaccinate her children. “I was going to immunize them but after information of worsening other children’s conditions I change my mind. I consider that vaccination is important for children, but I am in doubt of safety of this vaccine and I could not expose to danger my children’s health,” she said.             

Paata Imnadze claimed that this vaccination was held in almost every country of Europe, in central Asian countries, in Armenia and Azerbaijan, but problems appeared only in Georgia and in Ukraine. “One man died in Ukraine during vaccination and this caused panic in people, but according to the resolutions of every international expert, his death was not connected to vaccination. As for Georgia, about 350 people fainted, that’s all,” he said.

On November 18 Paata Imnadze vaccinated his children publicly to ensure people in safety of vaccine. ”Naturally I would not do it if I had even a little doubt towards security of this vaccination,” announced he.      

As Tamar Ugulava said, the campaign is considered conducted while covering 95% of target group. To her knowledge, the final figures are not counted, but approximate numbers are too low compared to planned.

“In Tbilisi we have 15% coverage, such low showings are in other big cities as well. But in regions and countries, for example in Samtskhe-Javakheti, Achara (Khulo), Samegrelo (Tsalenjikha, Martvili), almost 100% of target group was vaccinated,” declared Imnadze. As he said approximately 46% of total was vaccinated in whole Georgia.

Immunization campaign should have been finished on November 2, but it continued and as Imnadze said, everyone who wants to, can vaccinate in polyclinics till December 15.

Ghebi

The ball is rolling down on a slope. Nobody knows how many times it  has  happened during the day. Each of us is too tired, but we aren’t lazy to bring the ball back once more, but it’s already got dark and it’s impossible to play any more. We are separating till the next day.

At dawn before opening my eyes the fresh air coming from the window  makes me feel where I am. I am in Ghebi. It is the highest village in  Georgia’s mountainous region Racha, one of the most beautiful places     in our country.

The place of action is the yard of my house in Ghebi. The yard is  usually full of children playing there. I don’t know whether I am still  child or not, but I am among them. The yard is quite large and we can  play several kinds of games: football, basketball, tennis etc. On the    right side there is a slope and on the left side there is a river ravine. So,   sometimes we have to look with sad to one of our balls flying up the         fence and falling in the river. It’s not really boredom there.

What refers to the surrounding area, it is really delightful. There aren’t  fertile lands in Ghebi. So, there is only a little kitchen-garden in one  corner of our yard, fulled mainly with greens and carrots, not anything  else. There aren’t nice bushes and garden full of flowers as well. There      is natural beauty in Ghebi. We have lovely yard with soft green grass. It  is surrounded by the mountains the tops of which are covered with ice  in every seasons of year. One part of the yard is facing to the ravine of  the river Rioni. The noise of Rioni is heard in every period of time,  especially at night in silence. The sky is blue in Ghebi.

……………………

Environs are wrapped in white linen. The snow with two-three meters  high covers the ground floor of the house. The narrow way is paved    from stairs to gate. There is nowhere even a little kitchen-garden and  the trees are bare. We can’t notice children outside, they are only  looking from the frost-hardy windows, which are closed for several  months. Not only the tops, but the whole mountains are covered with  ice. Only Rioni flows in a same way, but swelled and more noisy. The  sky is white.

Probably, you have guessed that it is also my village but in winter.  You  are right, but my description might not be right. It’s only my  imagination, I have never been in Ghebi in winter.