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U.S. role in Georgia `coup' seen

By Vladimir Radyuhin

MOSCOW DEC. 1. The United States enacted a Yugoslav scenario in Georgia to remove from power its President, Eduard Shevardnadze, a former Russian security chief said here.

"The Georgian game was played well according to a scenario written for Yugoslavia three years ago," said Nikolai Kovalyov, former head of the Federal Security Service (FSB), successor to the Soviet-era KGB.

The Georgian leader resigned on Nov. 23 in the face mass demonstrations organised by his political opponents to protest against what they called was massive rigging of parliamentary elections. Mr. Kovalyov told Russia's RTR state television on Sunday that the "coup d'etat in Georgia had been carefully prepared according to the Yugoslav scenario". The Yugoslav President, Slobodan Milosevic, stepped down in 2000 amid public protests over alleged vote counting fraud.

Mr. Kovalyov, who is now deputy head of the security committee in the Russian lower House, the State Duma, said he had information that Georgian Opposition leaders, including the united Opposition candidate in coming presidential elections, Mikhail Saakashvili, had been trained in Serbia in training camps financed mainly by the United States. He drew attention to the fact that the current U.S. envoy to Georgia, Richard Miles, was American ambassador in Yugoslavia when Mr. Milosevic was overthrown, and earlier served in Azerbaijan during a coup d'etat there that brought Mr. Heydar Aliyev to power. Mr. Kovalyov said he was particularly concerned that nationals of six other former Soviet republics had undergone training in U.S.-run camps in Serbia along with Georgian Opposition leaders. "Representatives of Ukraine, Moldova, Armenia, Azerbaijan and some other countries, who had been trained here, took part in the November events in Georgia," Mr. Kovalyov said.

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