Georgy Kalatozishvili, Tbilisi. Exclusively to Vestnik Kavkaza
Georgia is shocked by the tragedy in Batumi. High school student Mariam Kochalidze went outside to ride a bike.
Batumi has all conditions for such trips: there is a bicycle park, bikes can be rented near special stakes. President Saakashvili did his best for “the Black Sea purl of Georgia” looked like the best European resorts. Bicycle paths on the seafront are marked red and pass for several km – to city suburbs. By “prolongation of the seafront,” the authorities motivate attraction of investments into construction of hotels and other seafront infrastructure. At the same time President and his team provided the policy of “zero tolerance” toward crime. Once, a local resident – a young man of 25 – who robbed a foreign tourist got 30 years of imprisonment. The tough punishment was explained by necessity of providing peace in the resort. The results are obvious. One can walk calmly in night Batumi. Local guys don’t even come close to tourists. Few people in Batumi could imagine that such an attitude could lead to threatening lives of local residents, while the desire to provide comfort and freedom of guests will turn against Batumi’s residents.
Mariam decided to ride till the end of the new seafront and didn’t pay attention to the solitude of the locality and its remoteness from residential buildings. Mary-go-rounds, volleyball grounds, palms presented to Georgia by an Arab sheikh, and pleasant music were around. However, there were no people: 6 p.m., suburbs, and the resort season was not at its peak.
Suddenly a man appeared on the bicycle path. He beat down the girl and cut her throat. Then, he took her Iphone-5, got on the victim’s bike, and disappeared. The crime was committed in the place where no video cameras were fixed. There are few of such parts on the seafront, but the murderer knew about “black zones” and waited for his victim in one of it. The police discovered the body only after midnight.
President Saakashvili stated that the murder was a result of the wide-scale amnesty provided by the new authorities. However, experts initially said that such a crime was beyond “local criminal culture.”
Later, a version about a maniac appeared. Residents of the closest residential district told that they saw a man near the seafront – he appeared with a black bag, but never showed up outside “a black zone”, as if he didn’t want to be detected by video cameras. According to European norms (many think that they are stupid), special signs warn where cameras are located. But Georgia wants to be like Europe.
Finally the police stated that the suspect was 28-year old citizen of Iran Mohammadamin Ruintania. He murdered and robbed the victim, felt the chase, went to the Georgian-Turkish border and crossed it in a half an hour after the murder. Later the Interior Ministry spread the video which showed how the criminal crossed the border. The Minister of Interior Affairs of Turkey promised his Georgian colleague to arrest the criminal sooner than he would cross the Turkish-Iranian border. Now nobody criticizes the government of Ivanishvili for cancelation of the visa-free regime with Iran.
