
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, January 6, 1994                   TAG: 9401060148
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-10   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: The Washington Post
DATELINE: MOSCOW                                LENGTH: Medium

GEORGIAN LEADER KILLS SELF

Zviad Gamsakhurdia, the fiery Georgian nationalist who became his country's first elected president only to be deposed eight months later, committed suicide on New Year's Eve when a rebel band he was leading was surrounded by Georgian troops, his wife said Wednesday.

Gamsakhurdia's wife, Manana, speaking in the southern Russian city of Grozny, said her husband killed himself Dec. 31 in western Georgia after being trapped by his enemies, news agencies reported.

Gamsakhurdia, 54, had a political career that flourished, fizzled and finally failed in a span of barely three years. The son of one of Georgia's best-known writers, he gained respect as a dissident in the late Soviet era.

His bitterest enemy was Eduard Shevardnadze, the former Soviet foreign minister who succeeded him as leader of Georgia. Gamsakhurdia accused Shevardnadze of being a Russian agent bent on subordinating Georgia's interests to the Kremlin.

A beloved figure in the Soviet era because of his insistence on self-determination for Georgia, Gamsakhurdia was overwhelmingly elected president of the nation of 5.4 million people in May 1991.

But once in power, he cracked down on opposition leaders and the press, accusing them of being spies. As he repeatedly postponed reforms, his popularity plummeted. In January 1992, he was overthrown in a bloody uprising and fled into exile in southern Russia.

Soon afterward, Shevardnadze was called on to return to his native Georgia and take power.

In late September last year, taking advantage of a separate uprising in Abkhazia, Gamsakhurdia returned from exile and led a bloody insurrection against Shevardnadze's government.

But the offensive stalled in late October after Shevardnadze made a deal with Moscow. In return for Georgia's joining the Russian-dominated Commonwealth of Independent States, Russian troops were deployed in Georgia. Within a week, Shevardnadze's forces were reinvigorated, and Gamsakhurdia's gains were quickly rolled back. By the first week of November, the rebels under Gamsakhurdia's command were in full retreat and Gamsakhurdia fled to Abkhazia - the second time he had to run for his life in less than two years.

Keywords:
FATALITY

by CNB