GEORGIA: RADICAL OPPOSITION CALLS PRESIDENT TO STEP DOWN








TBILISI, MARCH 7 (from RIA Novosti's David Imedashvili) - Radical oppositionaries are down on Georgia's President Eduard Shevardnadze for Abkhazia and South Ossetia falling off, an economic disaster, the death rate skyrocketing, and territorial clashes unsettled.


	More than 400 partisans of the late President Zviad Gamsakhurdia and the political party, Industry to Rescue Georgia, gathered in an embankment in Tbilisi's heart to demand a stop to "anti-national policies" and call President Shevardnadze to resign.


	The authorised rally was organised by an Alliance of Georgian National Forces, which brings together several parties that were backing the previous president, MPs of his time, and the present-day parliamentary group, 21st Century. They timed the rally to the 9th anniversary of the day when Eduard Shevardnadze, recent USSR Minister of Foreign Affairs, came back from Moscow.


	Similar rallies were reported today from Kutaisi and Senaki. A tougher rally in Zugdidi blocked the traffic in the town centre, and was dispersed by the police.