Nino Burjanadze, ex-parliamentary leader, said that while dispersing the rally riot police “besieged” the protesters and did not enable them to leave peacefully. She said that it was “a crime against the mankind.” 

“How can the Georgian President review the parade after this fact, when he blocked all the roads and did not enable the protesters to leave peacefully,” she told Maestro TV via phone. “They agreed to kill the people. These authorities will not have a long day.”

“I want to say that even General Rodionov [commander of Russian troops, which dispersed the protest rally in Tbilisi on April 9, 1989] and Russian special forces have not done what Georgian police and Mikheil Saakashvili did today, because on April 9 Russian troops moved on the Rustaveli Avenue from one side, thus leaving an exit for the people,” she said. 

“I can say that our struggle will not end by this. A new stage of struggle has started,” Burjanadze said. 

She also said that the authorities would not have endured to disperse the rally, if other opposition parties had joined the rally.