1. Nino Burjanadze is a Georgian politician and lawyer who served as Chairperson of the Parliament of Georgia from November 2001 to June 2008.
13 Facts About Nino Burjanadze
1. 2.
Nino Burjanadze withdrew into opposition to Saakashvili as the leader of the Democratic Movement-United Georgia party in 2008.
3.
Nino Burjanadze ended third with 10 percent of the vote.
4.
Nino Burjanadze graduated in 1986 from the Faculty of Law of the Tbilisi State University.
5.
In 1995, Burjanadze was elected to the Parliament of Georgia for the Union of Citizens of Georgia then chaired by the President of Georgia Eduard Shevardnadze and supported financially by her father Anzor Burjanadze, a wealthy businessman.
6.
Nino Burjanadze first chaired the Parliamentary Committee for Constitutional Law from 1998 to 1999, and the Parliamentary Committee for International Relations from 2000 to 2001.
7.
Nino Burjanadze was closely allied with the reformist wing within the UCG led by Mikheil Saakashvili and Zurab Zhvania whom she succeeded on 9 November as parliamentary chairperson after Zhvania resigned on 1 November 2001.
8.
Nino Burjanadze was an obvious candidate for the post, as she is widely respected by her compatriots - opinion polling in 2003 showed her to be one of Georgia's three most popular political figures.
9.
Nino Burjanadze was designated to lead the United National Movement party list for the parliamentary elections scheduled on 21 May 2008, but on 21 April she announced, in a surprise move, that she would not seek reelection due to a lack of consensus in the compilation of the National Movement's party list.
10.
Nino Burjanadze accused Saakashvili of arranging the arrests to intimidate the opposition.
11.
The protests led by Nino Burjanadze began on 21 May 21,2011 when over 10,000 Georgians attended a demonstration in Tbilisi demanding Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili's resignation.
12.
Nino Burjanadze has been a lead figure in the demonstrations.
13.
Nino Burjanadze is married to Badri Bitsadze, the former head of the Department of Georgian State Border Defence, who stood down shortly after Nino Burjanadze's political transformation.