TBILISI. March 5 (Interfax) - A number of Georgian government officials and members of some opposition parties see former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili's public statements in Kyiv as destructive and "fuelling the flame in the extremely explosive situation in Ukraine."
"I want to tell the United National Movement leaders to advise their leader to board a plane and immediately leave Kyiv, as all of his so-called freedom-loving and anti-Russian statements are like a red rag to a bull," Georgian State Minister for Reintegration Alexi Petrishvili told journalists.
"Saakashvili is trying to rehabilitate himself for the collapse in Georgia and act as if he is fighting for the Ukrainian people's freedom," he said.
Nino Burjanadze, the leader of the opposition party Democratic Freedom-United Georgia, charged that Saakashvili, who has "settled" in Kyiv over the past several days, "is escalating the situation in Ukraine by his disgraceful PR stunts."
"TV channels recently showed Saakashvili near a map of Ukraine discussing military plans as if being a commander who smashed the Russians in his own country. Such PR actions are detrimental to Georgia," Burjanadze said.
Georgian media have reported recently that Saakashvili has regularly appeared at rallies in Kyiv and given interviews shown on some TV channels in which he called Russia an aggressor and urged the international community to punish it and immediately admit Ukraine and Georgia to NATO.