#Mikheil Saakshvili

[deadpresidents]

Everyone knows about Lincoln and Garfield and McKinley and Kennedy, the quartet of America Presidents who fell victim to assassination. Even the most casual observers of Presidential history can probably name the four Presidents who were murdered while in office, and many even know the names of the four assassins responsible for their deaths: Booth, Guiteau, Czolgosz, and Oswald.

There have also been quite a few (in)famous unsuccessful assassination attempts, where Presidents barely escaped with their lives, that many Americans are familiar with, including (but not limited to):

•Richard Lawrence's miraculously unlucky double misfire on the steps of the U.S. Capitol in 1835 which left Andrew Jackson unharmed but resulted in Lawrence -- who would be found not guilty by reason of insanity -- getting viciously pummeled by the cane-wielding President Jackson until Davy Crockett intervened to save the would-be assassin from the 67-year-old President. •The shooting of former President Theodore Roosevelt in Milwaukee as he sought another term in the White House during the 1912 Presidential election. Despite being shot in the chest, Roosevelt decided to go ahead and deliver his campaign speech before being taken to the hospital where doctors discovered that the bullet lodged inside of TR had first passed through a case for his eyeglasses and the thick pages of his speech in his jacket's pocket, lessening the damage from the gunshot. •The attempted assassination of President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt in Miami in February 1933, just seventeen days in before FDR's Inauguration, which wounded four people and killed Chicago Mayor Anton Cermak. •The ill-fated 1950 attempt by Puerto Rican nationalists to storm Blair House (the temporary Presidential residence during the renovation of the White House) and kill President Harry S. Truman as he was napping. Truman was not hurt, but a White House Police Officer and one of the two assassins were killed during the wild shootout. •President Gerald Ford's trouble with two California women who separately tried to kill him in Sacramento and then San Francisco just two weeks apart in September 1975. •The shocking shooting of President Ronald Reagan in broad daylight from just a few yards away as he exited the Washington Hilton following a speech in March 1981, which left four people wounded and very nearly killed the 70-year-old Reagan just two months into his Presidency.

But what is amazing is that, in this age of instant information and the constant regurgitation of media coverage via the 24-hour news cycle, very few Americans know that there is a man sitting in prison in the former Soviet Republic of Georgia for attempting to assassinate President George W. Bush. What even less Americans realize is how close Vladimir Arutyunian actually came to accomplishing his task.

On May 10, 2005, President Bush spoke to a large crowd at an outdoor rally in Tbilisi, Georgia. In one of the photos at the top of this post, Bush is seen speaking from the stage in Tbilisi. The other photo is of Arutyunian holding a plaid handkerchief close to his chest. Wrapped in that handkerchief was a live hand grenade.

As President Bush spoke, nearby sat his wife, Laura, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, and the Dutch-born First Lady of Georgia, Sandra Roelofs. They had no idea that, during the speech, Arutyunian tossed his handkerchief-wrapped grenade towards the stage. The grenade landed just 61 feet away from President Bush, well within range of causing serious injury, if not death.

Of course, the grenade did not explode. At first, it was thought to be a dud, but upon closer inspection it was discovered that the only reason the grenade didn't explode was because Arutyunian's handkerchief -- used to conceal the explosive as he stood in the crowd -- was wrapped too tightly around the grenade, preventing the firing pin from deploying. A Georgian security official noticed the grenade, grabbed it quickly and disposed of it as Arutyunian disappeared into the massive crowd and President Bush continued speaking.

After Bush's speech was over and once it was recognized that the President had only narrowly escaped a legitimate attempted assassination, Georgian police worked closely with the United States Secret Service, the FBI, and the U.S. Justice Department to investigate the assassination attempt and find the would-be assassin who seemingly melted into Tbilisi after his brazen, albeit unsuccessful attempt on Bush's life. Using DNA evidence and tips from informants, the Georgian police ultimately tracked down Arutyunian two months later. When they went to arrest Arutyunian, a gunfight broke out and Arutyunian killed Zurab Kvlividze, a top counterterrorism official with Georgia's Interior Ministry. Arutyunian was wounded before finally being captured with the assistance of Georgian Special Forces.

The Georgians tried Arutyunian on the murder of the police officer, as well as the attempted assassinations of President Bush and President Saakshvili. Arutyunian was sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole. A federal grand jury in the United States also indicted Arutyunian on the federal charge of the attempted assassination of the President of the United States, which is a felony. The U.S., however, has not attempted nor has any potential plans to extradite the failed assassin from Georgia, and Arutyunian will almost certainly spend the rest of his life in a Georgian prison.

[zvaigzdelasas]

this is also *after* they survived Saakashvili going through with a hatchet

both from 2020

Mikheil Saakashvili, the former president of Georgia, has been installed in a top position co-ordinating reforms in Ukraine, where the war-battered economy has been plunged into a deep recession by the coronavirus crisis. President Volodymyr Zelensky on Thursday appointed the exiled Georgian politician head of the executive committee of Ukraine’s National Reform Council after an earlier plan to make him deputy premier ran into political opposition. “I believe that he will be able to give an impetus to the National Reform Council and help make important changes in the life of the country,” Mr Zelensky said in a statement after appointing Mr Saakashvili. Mr Saakashvili said that Ukraine needed to “speed up the anti-bureaucratic revolution” begun after Mr Zelensky’s election as president last year. “Either we tackle corruption through deregulation, shutting down opportunities for extortion and deliver on the crackdown on corruption, or the country might cease to exist,” he told the FT.[...]

One of Mr Saakashvili’s tasks could be smoothing the way to an emergency loan programme from the IMF. Kyiv and the fund were negotiating an 18-month loan programme rather than a three-year standby facility, the IMF said on Thursday. While trying to drum up support for his appointment, Mr Saakashvili in a Financial Times interview late last month urged the IMF to “at least double” the loans it envisaged making to shore up Ukraine’s economy this year. He said an $8bn loan programme offered by the IMF with nearly $4bn disbursed this year “is not enough”.[...]

Ukraine’s business community was initially concerned by the return of a politician with a strong reform record while serving as president of Georgia but also known for falling out with political allies. But it has become more hopeful that Mr Saakashvili could speed up reforms, such as deregulation and securing more affordable lending for small businesses in an economy dominated by oligarchs. The business community has also supported Mr Saakashvili’s calls for more IMF funding this year.

“The private business community does feel, because of the economic storm Ukraine faces with the pandemic and global recession and conflict in Donbas, that Ukraine needs additional funding from the IMF,” said Morgan Williams, President of the US-Ukraine Business Council.

“I am deeply convinced that economic recovery and overcoming the crisis can only be done by easing regulations and lowering taxes,” Mr Saakashvili said in a Facebook post this week. “I will remind you that in Georgia we reduced taxes by 62 per cent and this led to unprecedented four times growth of the economy!!!” he added.

[RFE/RL is US State Media]

The council was created in 2014 to carry out strategic planning and coordinate reforms. Saakashvili, 52, served as Georgia’s president from 2004 until 2013. In January 2018, a Georgian court convicted him in absentia of covering up evidence in the case of the killing of a Georgian banker and sentenced him to three years in prison. In June 2018, another court convicted him of abuse of power and sentenced him to six years in prison. Saakashvili has denied all the accusations and says the charges are politically motivated. In 2015-2016, Saakashvili served as governor of Ukraine’s Odesa region. When he resigned, he accused Zelenskiy’s predecessor, Petro Poroshenko, of corruption. Poroshenko, in turn, stripped Saakashvili of his Ukrainian citizenship.

As one of his first acts as president last year, Zelenskiy restored Saakashvili’s Ukrainian citizenship, facilitating Saakshvili’s return to Ukraine. Last month, Saakashvili said he had been offered the post of deputy prime minister in charge of reform. But it was unclear if parliament would confirm him. Georgia called the possible appointment “unacceptable” in view of Saakashvili’s convictions there and threatened to withdraw its ambassador to Kyiv for consultations.

every time another piece of news comes out about how the united states is pressuring the ukrainian government to institute brutal austerity measures and sell every part of the national infrastructure that isn't nailed down i think about the amount of vitriol and pushback i got for saying that the usa & friends did not in fact have the best interests of the ukrainian people at heart