Tbilisi commemorated violence against peaceful demonstrators by hundreds of hands covered in dark pink paint leaving their imprints on a white wall. For representatives of civil society and the opposition 7/11 represents a day of injustice against anti-Government demonstrators rather than an American chain of convenience stores. A rally conducted near the Parliament building on Rustaveli Avenue on Saturday, November 7, 2009, marked the second anniversary of the violent dispersal of peaceful protestors by the Georgian Government on the same day in 2007.

Participants of the demonstration first gathered at the Public Broadcasting building. Nana Kakabadze, one of the demonstration’s organisers, said that the slogan for this large-scale action was “Fight Until Victory.”
Before heading to Parliament the public heard an address by Nineli Chankvetadze, a Georgian actress. It stated that the Government committed a crime against the Georgian population on 7 November, 2007. It called for President Mikheil Saakashvili and his National Movement Party to resign from their posts.

Representatives of the opposition parties also gathered at the Radisson hotel on Rustaveli Avenue to share assessments of Saakashvili’s 6 years in power. Organised by Salome Zourabichvili, the former Foreign Minister and now leader of The Way of Georgia, this meeting attracted delegates from the Conservative Party, Movement for United Georgia, Democratic Movement-United Georgia, Party of the People, Movement for Fair Georgia, Green Party, Industrialists and other opposition parties as well as representative of NGOs and foreign diplomats. Accounts presented by the opposition covered such issues as freedom of the press, conflict resolution, security threats and political prisoners.
Levan Gachechiladze, leader of Protect Georgia, also attended the meeting as a guest.
Prior to leaving the hotel he said that he hopes history will appropriately evaluate the activities of Saakashvili’s Government. “I’m sure he will go down in history as a traitor to Georgia,” Gachechiladze said.

During the demonstration the participants also disseminated an address to the U.S. Ambassador to Georgia. Appealing to the United States as Georgia’s ally, representatives of civil society called on U.S. officials to fulfill their commitments under the Charter on Strategic Cooperation between the United States and Georgia. The address cited the commitments of the U.S. administration to Georgia and the Georgian people as outlined by Vice-President Joseph Biden during his official visit to Georgia three months ago. Biden called for a restoration of the balance between the legislative, executive and judicial branches of Government, a free media, fair elections and the effective involvement of opposition parties in politics. The address also quoted Biden as stating that the above-mentioned changes were necessary for Georgia to integrate with the European and Euro-Atlantic community. The address claimed that Georgian society has witnessed no initiative on the part of the Government to meet the requirements stated by Biden.

On November 7, 2007 the Georgian police unleashed tear gas and water cannon on protestors gathered outside the Parliament building calling for the resignation of President Mikheil Saakashvili. Clashes began at around 8 a.m. local time when police attempted to disperse around 100 protestors, including 47 hunger strikers, who had been camped outside the Parliament building for six days. A crowd of 3,000 gathered to support the original 100 demonstrators as they fled from the security forces. Policemen in riot gear chased demonstrators along the streets, beating them with batons. Hundreds of people were injured.

That same evening Georgian special forces entered the building of Imedi TV and effectively closed the station down. The station claimed that about 30 journalists and cameramen were injured in the raid. Imedi reopened in December 2007 under new ownership. Previously belonging to the family of its late founder Badri Patarkatsishvili, it is now run by Saakashvili’s ally, Giorgi Arveladze, who has become the General Director of the Georgia Media Production Group (GMPG), a holding which now includes Imedi.