Salome Zurabishvili has been elected president of Georgia, becoming the first woman to take the post in the Caucasus country’s history.
The 66-year-old former foreign minister took nearly 60 percent of the vote after Wednesday’s ballot, well clear of the 40 percent of her rival, Grigol Vashadze, who also once held the post of foreign minister, news agency Tass reported.
Zurabishvili was an independent but was backed the Georgian Dream party which wants closer ties with both Russia and the European Union.
Speaking last night, the newly elected president vowed to keep her election platform promise to balance fraught relations between Georgia, Russia and the West.
“Our choice is peaceful Georgia, united country, and of equal citizens”, said Zurabishvili, whose family fled Georgia following the Soviet occupation in 1921.
“Our choice is the dialogue with those parts of society who today have not voted for me and who today don’t agree with us. But we are all citizens of one country. I know very well the price of independence and freedom, because I am the child of the country whose ancestors have sacrificed themselves [for this].”
However, the 66-year-old has faced criticism from opponents who view her as a pro-Russian candidate - a claim that she and the Georgian Dream party strongly deny, the Associated Press reports. Nevertheless, some Georgians “look at her foreign background with suspicion and criticise her for her contention that Georgia started the 2008 war with Russia”.
Observers view this election as a key indicator for Georgia’s 2020 parliamentary elections.“For the Georgian Dream, the stakes are especially high,” said Ghia Nodia, founder of the Caucasus Institute for Peace, Democracy and Development, a Tbilisi-based independent think tank.
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