of the party's restriction of Georgian nationalism, Khrushchev's policy of de-Stalinization was, paradoxically, a blow to Georgian national pride. The younger generation of the Georgians, not fully acquainted with the darker side of Stalin's rule and bred on the panegyrics and permanent praise of the "genius" of Stalin, was proud to consider him being a Georgian that ruled over great Russia, and, as believed widely, dominated the world. Now, Stalin's denigration was seen as a symbol for the mistreatment of Georgian national consciousness at the hands of the Russian/Soviet rulers. Patriotic sentiment mixed with political protest was further inflamed by the sarcastic and bitter manner in which Khrushchev ascribed all horrors of the era to the "genial" leader Stalin, whom, as he ironically put it, the Georgians so much enjoyed calling "the great son of the Georgian nation". Eduard Shevardnadze, then a Komsomol leader in Kutaisi and eventually to become President of post-Soviet Georgia, later recalled that Khrushchev's ironic remark on Georgians at the end of his speech was particularly hurtful to the pride of Georgian youth. The painful reaction caused by de-Stalinization in Georgia has been variously interpreted. It has been seen by many as a revival of Stalinism and by others as the first open expression of Georgian nationalism since the abortive revolt in 1924. Sergei Arutiunov of the Russian Academy of Sciences relates: The events in Georgia passed largely unreported in the Soviet press and became a taboo theme for several decades to come. What happened can be reconstructed on the analysis of several, though frequently conflicting, contemporary reports, eyewitnesses' accounts and a few surviving secret Soviet documents. Demonstrations According to the special report of Vladimir Janjgava, Georgian SSR Minister of Internal Affairs, the unrest began on 4 March 1956, when groups of students gathered to mark the third anniversary of Stalin's death at the Stalin monument at the Kura embankment in downtown Tbilisi. Indignant at Khrushchev's speech, they were aggressive towards the policemen who had thrown a cordon around the area. Georgian communist Parastishvili climbed the Stalin monument, drank some wine from a bottle, smashed the bottle and said: "Let Stalin's enemies die, like this bottle!". The demonstration gradually grew large, attracting more and more people, who were bringing memorial wreaths to the Stalin monument. The confused local authorities did not actively oppose these activities. The demonstrations in the capital triggered similar protests in other parts