Emzar Kvitsiani

Emzar Kvitsiani (, ; born 25 April 1961) is a former Georgian military commander, warlord, and politician.

Born in 1961 in the Abkhaz ASSR, an autonomous region of the Georgian SSR, one of the 15 republics of the Soviet Union, Kvitsiani took part in the War in Abkhazia (1992–1993), forming a paramilitary group the Monadire in the upper Kodori Valley, guarding it from Abkhaz forces. He was mainly active in the valley, which he de facto ruled over through his militia from 1992 to 2006.

In 1999, President Eduard Shevardnadze appointed Kvitsiani to the post of presidential special envoy to the Kodori Valley. Kvitsiani allegedly cooperated with Chechen field commander Ruslan Gelayev in 2001 in an attempt to bring Abkhazia back under Georgian government control.

Kvitsiani later opposed the 2003 Rose Revolution, which subsequently led to confrontation with the Georgia's central authorities under Mikheil Saakashvili. As president, Sakaashvili removed him from his official government position in December 2004 and disbanded the Monadire in April 2005. Kvitsiani declared that he would openly defy the authorities and was subsequently ousted from the Kodori Valley in 2006. He fled to the Russian Federation’s North Caucasus region, where he lived for several years, but was arrested when he returned to Georgia in 2014.

Kvitsiani was initially sentenced to 16 years in jail, but was then released under a plea bargain in early 2015. He was one of the leaders of the Alliance of Patriots of Georgia and a member of Parliament of Georgia.

Career Kvitsiani was born in 1961 in the village of Chkhalta, part of the predominantly ethnic Georgian Svan upper Kodori valley in the then-Soviet Abkhazia, an autonomous republic within the Georgian SSR. He finished the Novosibirsk Institute of National Economy and later graduated the Kyiv General Staff Academy with honors. According various reports, he had a criminal record during the Soviet period. A detailed academic study claims he developed contacts to Soviet organized crime while in jail, and that after his release he was involved in running illegal casinos in Abkhazia.

After the secessionist war broke out in Abkhazia in 1992, Kvitsiani organized a militia force of several hundred fighters named Monadire ("the Hunter") in the upper Kodori valley in order to fend off the Abkhaz threat. He succeeded in keeping the strategically crucial gorge under the control of his militia after the retreat of the Georgian forces from Abkhazia in 1993, though militia in the area reportedly also demanded money and possessions from fleeing civilians, in exchange for passage.

Kvitsiani's role in the abduction of the United Nations and Georgian officials in Kodori in the 1990s, the 2001 Kodori crisis, and various supposed criminal activities in the region have been disputed. During a crossfire, a local woman was killed. To avoid further casualties, Kvitsiani and the remnant of his followers were allowed through a military cordon. Georgia set up a local administration of the valley under the aegis of the Government of the Autonomous Republic of Abkhazia, but lost control over it during the August 2008 Russia–Georgia war. Kvitsiani has repeatedly stressed and maintains to this date that the former Georgian leadership under grip of powerful outside influence has purposefully worked towards handing over the Kodori valley and that it was their plan all along.

After his ouster from the Kodori valley, Kvitsiani eventually fled to the Russian North Caucasus, from where he issued threats of guerrilla warfare to the Georgian government. flew from Moscow to Tbilisi, where he was arrested upon his arrival at the Tbilisi International Airport. He declared he knew the authorities were going to arrest him, but he wanted to cooperate and seek justice.

Political engagement post-2015 Kvitsiani is one of the leaders of the Alliance of Patriots of Georgia, a populist party that gained six seats in the parliamentary elections in Georgia in October 2016. Kvitsiani has also been seen at several rallies in Tbilisi held by Georgian March, a far-right, anti-LGBT and anti-immigration group.