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The News in Brief

Friday, March 26
25 March is day of restoration Georgian Church's autocephaly

The Georgian Orthodox Church celebrates the restoration of its autocephaly on March 25.

Catholicos Patriarch of Georgia Ilia the Second conducted a prayer service at Sioni Cathedral.

The Patriarchate of Antioch granted self-governance (autocephaly) to the Georgian Orthodox Church in 457, but Russia abolished it in 1811. From that sate a Russian Synod exarchate led the Georgian Church. It regained its autocephaly on March 25, 1917 and its independence was recognised by all Orthodox Churches, though not always officially. All the Orthodox Patriarchates officially recognised the Georgian Church's autocephaly in 1990 following efforts by the present Patriarch of Georgia. (Interpressnews)



Ethnic Georgian released after four-month captivity

Georgian Vagner Partsvania has been released by the Russian occupying forces after fours months of captivity. For three months he was held in a Sokhumi isolator in a wet and dark cell, he has related. For the last month he was held in the occupiers' Gali district headquarters.

Vagner Partsvania was kidnapped from Chuburkhinji village and the occupiers, who extorted 50,000 Russian rubbles from his family over these four months, took his Uaz truck away. Georgian law enforcers have already questioned the former hostage. (Rustavi 2)



Copy of the Memorial of Glory will be built in Moscow

The war memorial to Georgian soldiers who died in the Second World War formerly in Kutaisi will be rebuilt in Moscow, its Mayor, Yuri Luzhkov, announced on Wednesday.

It will be reconstructed in the Alley of Glory behind the Great Patriotic War Museum on Moscow’s Poklonny Hill.

"The rationale behind the future monument should be: we were together in the fight against fascism," Luzhkov said.

The memorial will not be an exact copy of the 40-metre tall monument in Kutaisi which was demolished by the Georgian Government. It will be 10-12 metres high.

The Mayor’s Office also announced that the tender for the design of the monument would be public and take place from April 1 to June 1. (Rustavi 2)



We Ourselves and Peoples Party publish results of voter list monitoring

We Ourselves has summed up its monitoring of the voters list. Members of the party said at a briefing yesterday that their activists had identified numerous inaccuracies in the list.

The party has published the results of its monitoring in Tbilisi, Rustavi, Khashuri, Telavi, Zestaponi and Kobuleti. They say most of the irregularities appeared in the so-called Italian Yards, where most of the voters listed were impossible to find.

At the briefing the party members displayed specific facts of inaccuracy. They will send the results of the monitoring to the Central Election Commission tomorrow.

The People's Party also published the results of its own voter list monitoring yesterday. They monitored five constituencies in Kutaisi and say the irregularities in the lists are numerous, as it includes 30 dead people and 2,000 people who are not in Georgia currently. The party will also send the results of its monitoring to the CEC. (Rustavi 2)



Restoration of infrastructure of Poti discussed at Government session

A session of the Georgian Government was held in the seaside town of Poti on Wednesday. The Cabinet Ministers discussed the restoration of the infrastructure of the town and proposed to allocate GEL 21 million to restore the water supply system. The town will also be provided with a full natural gas supply from next year.

The Government members said at the session that the first stage of the construction of the Free Industrial Zone in Poti will be completed in May. Licenses have already been issued to 22 companies who will presumably start constructing their enterprises in a few months. LG will be one of the first companies to take space there. (Rustavi 2)