Greetings!
Congratulations on police day!
Honorary co-warriors, our dear fellow citizens, respected Ambassadors, dear guests,
today is a brilliant holiday of Saint George, congratulations to you all on this holiday!
If something protects our country, if there is any force protecting our police, first of all it is St George that is the symbol of defeating evil by kindness, it is the symbol of the victory of kindness over evil.
What you all do on the daily, what you have already achieved and are achieving day by day, is what no one expected, what was considered to be mission impossible.
Your work is daily victory over evil forces of past and darkness. Your work is daily victory over superstition and stereotypes.
Your victory, your work is daily victory over what everybody thought was undefeatable.
This is criminal, this is injustice, and illegality and this is humiliation of people by bad people.
Everybody thought that this was an incurable disease of our society and it was impossible to heal the society from this disease.
We were raised in a country where the monuments were erected to the bandits. The Police personnel are rather young, but you all witnessed these processes.
They used to create favorite literature characters out of them and we all were raised on the examples of these bandits.
We were raised in a country, where first, communist party apparatus were criminals and later post-communists were united under the shelter of independence. Many politicians and me used to serve in the period when the Minister of Internal Affairs and other high-ranking police officers used to escort the bosses of the Georgian mafia from the airport with great honor.
But in every period, there were exceptions that used to fight with criminal and organized crime.
I remember it very well because I was raised in the family of a lawyer.
My grandfather taught at Legal Faculty and I remember many police officers that used to come to visit my family. The aim of their life was fight with criminal in the 70ies.
I remember your police officer that gave me a militia hat and I was very proud of that hat. He used to tell me: I will fight with bandits and thieves throughout my life. In nine months the criminals killed him.
I remember in my childhood "thieves in laws" exploded the house of the Chief of Borjomi Militia, because he dared to start fight against criminals.
I remember young prosecutors and police officers, who dared to fight against criminal. This was an exception in the system.
Later this organized crime grew so much that it was impossible to imagine the fact that we could ever get rid of it.
The Rose Revolution has not happened in order to bring one political force for the neutralization of another political force. Rose Revolution was caused by the situation when it became necessary to defend Georgian statehood. People came out on the streets because they didn't have electricity, natural gas, salaries and pensions and at the same time to defeat organized crime. To defeat those people who used to suck the blood of the Georgian population.
In 2004, when together with you, we started reforms, it was very painful and huge struggle.
The chance of success was very low, but the healthy part of our society came and happened something that no one had expected.
Our predecessors used to tell us that the whole society is corrupt, everybody is involved in the games of corruption and criminal, it is impossible to improve and change it. Though people came out on the streets and stood beside us, they believed that we had a chance to establish a totally different state with clean hands and hearts.
I want to tell you that our attempt finished with success.
Crime was reduced in Georgia by several times. We declared zero tolerance policy that worked well.
It is the merit of you and this reform that today mothers can send their children to school without any fear, it is practically not necessary to lock cars.
I remember when I returned to Georgia I was a young MP and became the Chairman of the Legal Committee I was told that I had to find a common language with these criminals.
I remember very well the first operation in Svaneti, when a large group of organized criminals was neutralized, after an attack from the air. These people were terrorizing the whole Svaneti, this peaceful and beautiful part of our country.
I still was a leader of a political party when we had to get permission to get to Svaneti.
Personally I, of course never asked for permission, but the government itself and everyone else either asked for this permission or just tried to avoid going to Svaneti. We have undergone all these.
We went through times when the chiefs of Georgian police were the major narcotic-barons in Georgia. Narcotics were the major problem at every level of our society and we went through it as well. We went through the sabotage arranged by "thieves in law", when we declared a severe fight against them in the streets and prisons. They organized a strike in prison and we had to use force against them.
I understand anger of those people, who were protesting in the streets, but in fact in November, 2007... the Georgian police managed to stop a coup, which would have triggered collapse of the Georgian statehood; hence you have saved the Georgian state.
Such a clean action carried out at that time by our police, taking into the consideration the large scale of those demonstrations, is extremely rare; look what is happening in Greece, what was happening in Italy, and in other parts of the world. Let's compare this all to what happened in Georgia.
Of course we still have to do a lot. We have created a police that has public trust.
There was police in a country, where there was no electricity, though the prisoners were switched on electrical devices, tortured them and this way they were getting testimonies from them.
We were raised in a country where there was fixed "tax" on every type of crime, even on murder. It was possible to pay for every type of crime. It was very hard to change all these, but we managed to eliminate it.
As a result of fundamental reforms carried out in the police after the Rose Revolution, it was made possible to eradicate the criminal mentality when criminal bosses or the so-called "thieves in law" ruled the country.
It was part of our social transformation.
Not everything was always ideal. Of course, there were shortcomings and there were crimes committed by separate persons. Of course, at various stages the human rights situation was not always without black spots and problems, but eventually everything moved into the right direction and we will do our best not to return back.
Of course there will be some kind of shortages and gaps in police system, but today it is lowered to minimum. There always will be people who will disgrace the dignity of their uniforms.
They will also pay for their behaviors like those people, who were implementing illegality, who committed murders and were involved in corruption. No one will have any privileges.
We all should understand that Georgian police is one of the best police throughout the world - all foreign observers acknowledge it and I think, just that is why, our police that had 5% trust in 2004, now has over 80% trust, according to the results of any public opinion polls.
People love police and not only because the order was established, but because you know how to communicate with people, they see in you human defenders. In those glass buildings, where you sit, people see friends, relatives, sisters and brothers.
The honesty of our police is not explained by good salaries or good equipment. Some might have better salaries, the equipment might be of much better quality, but the most important what you have is dignity, honesty, competency and the sense of nationality.
The representatives of different ethnicities work shoulder-by-shoulder and do very important job in our police, among them the development of our new society, multicultural state unity.
I will never forget August and September of 2008. I will never forget how Rikoti was bombed. I was coming to Tbilisi from Zugdidi. People were in panic and were coming back from other regions in order to escape. Police officers stood on every kilometer and were bringing the traffic in order. They were ignoring bombs falling on their heads.
I remember those policemen who took penalties to the houses. I remember policemen coming to my close friends, saying - don't be afraid, we will maintain everything, our government knows what they do, we have future and please don't get in panic.
I really don't know the names of everyone, but I want to express my gratitude to all these anonymous policemen, who did this during those days. It was equal to military and civil heroism.
I want everyone, who wants to restore Soviet empire to know - Soviet empire is attacking us now.
Soviet Union is over in Georgia. Symbolically, Soviet Union was over when the uniforms of Soviet militia were changed by new Georgian uniforms with five red stars.
New mentality, new generation and our future will never allow the past to return.
This is a territory that is free from Soviet Union. Soviet Union that occupies South Ossetia and Abkhazia now, will never be able to maintain these regions and will never be able to occupy the rest of Georgia.
The rest of Georgia, our society that is united like one fist, also our armed forces and police will pay respective answer to them.
Our aim is to avoid this all.
You will have to listen to so much disgraceful words, you will have to stand so much that you haven't deserved. There were so much bad facts that caused deserved criticism in address of the government and police. This was a symbolic attack on the Georgian statehood. This is why we say that police is depoliticized.
Of course, police is depoliticized but depolitization does not mean saying no to statehood.
A respond to those, who will dare to destroy the Georgian statehood, doesn't mean that police is politicized.
I saw placards and slogans on TV - we have lost 40 exceptional men, we have lost 36 exceptional men and as a rule, these people (besides some exceptions) were criminals.
Those people, who were killed during the attack with Georgian police units were used for criticizing the government.
I want to read the list of those policemen who had started the development of this new force with us and who could not live to this day.
Kkulordava, died in village Ganmukhuri, when occupants opened fire to the existing block-post in Ganmukhuri.
Pipia, died near the existing block-post in village Khurcha during attack.
Kakhniashvili, died in village Dvani, exploded on the bomb.
Khachapuridze, died in village Dvani during patrolling, exploded on the bomb.
Skhvitaridze, died in village Dvani, Gorgi region.
Tsotniashvili, died near Karaleti, the bullet of sniper killed him.
Occupants in Tsalenjikha killed Jejelava.
Occupants in Kareli region killed Kakhniashvili.
Chumburidze, died in the process of detaining a criminal.
Jioshvili, exploded on the bomb in village Dvani.
Aptsiauri, died during detaining a criminal.
Kochishvili, died during patrolling in the conflict zone.
I want all of us to revere the memory of the colleagues who died.
Several years ago children were raised in the streets having a dream of becoming the so called "thieves in law".
Today you are securing not only their security, but you are an example for them as well.
Many kids like to wear your symbols, children like to play police games and they are proud of you.
The governments always replace each other. Every President finishes his term, but the spirit you wakened will get stronger. Nothing can kill this spirit, the way nothing can kill the freedom of Georgia.
Thank you very much!
Stand firm to unite Georgia!