12:04, 17 December 2003

New Georgian leadership intends to amnesty convicted followers of Zviad Gamsakhurdia

He held the higher post in the country in 1992-1993. The amnesty will apply not only to those people who are imprisoned now but also to those - there are about 150 of them, according to some data - who have been hiding in the forests of western Georgia for all these years.

Some followers of Zviad Gamsakhurdia laid down arms in the mid 1990s, the others either went to the forests or left the country.

Source: Ekho Moskvy Radio