Georgia PM Found Dead; President Assumes Functions
Thu Feb 3,10:09 AM ET
By Niko Mchedlishvili
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=574&e=4&u=/nm/20050203/wl_nm/georgia_premier_dc
TBILISI, Georgia (Reuters) - The prime minister of ex-Soviet Georgia was found dead on Thursday in a bizarre gas poisoning that robs the inexperienced president, Mikhail Saakashvili, of a steadying hand to help run his turbulent country.
Saakashvili said he was taking over the functions of Zurab Zhvania, one of the few heavyweights in his reformist leadership who will be hard to replace. It was not clear if this was a temporary move or not.
Zhvania's bodyguards found the 41-year-old slumped in an armchair near a gas heater at a friend's apartment, said Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili. "This is a tragic accident ... It was a gas poisoning," he said.
Zhvania was the senior figure in a trio of leaders who spearheaded a "Rose Revolution" of street protests that toppled veteran leader Eduard Shevardnadze in November 2003 and then installed the West-leaning Saakashvili in power. <...>
NO EVIDENCE OF FOUL PLAY Zhvania's body was found at 4:30 a.m. (0130 GMT) when his guards, worried that he was not answering his mobile phone, broke down the door of the friend's apartment, said Merabishvili. The friend, a middle-ranking official, also died.
There was no evidence of foul play, forensic experts said. Tests showed Zhvania's blood contained fatal levels of a substance called carboxihaemoglobin, said Justice Ministry official Levan Samkharauli.
"That means that the cause of death was carbon monoxide gas," he said. A post mortem report is expected on Friday.
Gas poisoning is common in Georgia, mainly caused by the heaters run off gas canisters that people use in winter, when power supplies are erratic.
Georgia lies in the Caucasus mountains, on the transit route for oil and gas exports from the Caspian Sea to the West, and is racked by simmering conflicts over the separatist regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia.
Zhvania was widely seen as a moderating influence on Saakashvili, a 37-year-old U.S.-trained lawyer who is prone to emotional outbursts and provoking confrontation. There were widespread reports of rivalry between the two men but they never aired this in public. <...>
Under Georgian law, the president has seven days to announce a full-time replacement for Zhvania. The candidate must then be approved by parliament, which is dominated by Saakashvili supporters.
Zhvania is survived by a wife and three children.
(Additional reporting by Margarita Antidze) <...>
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