Mingrelian affair
This article needs additional citations for verification. (January 2022) |
The Mingrelian affair, or Mingrelian case (Russian: Мингрельское дело, mingrel’skoe delo; Georgian: მეგრელთა საქმე, megrelt’a sak’me), was a series of criminal cases fabricated in 1951 and 1952 in order to accuse several members of the Georgian SSR Communist Party of Mingrelian extraction of secession and collaboration with the Western powers.
Events[edit]
Initiated on the personal orders of the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin, the affair apparently aimed at eliminating the influence of Lavrentiy Beria, of whom Stalin was growing increasingly suspicious.[1] The fabricated accusations of forming the "Mingrelian nationalist ring", separatism, collaboration with the "Western imperialists", and the Georgian émigré centre in Paris, were followed by a purge, which delivered a hard blow to the Georgian party organization, and specifically targeted its Mingrelian (a subethnic group of the Georgians) members, mostly Beria's protégés. Many leading officials were removed from their posts and arrested; thousands of innocent people were subjected to repressions. Kandid Charkviani, who at the time occupied the position of the first secretary of the Georgian SSR, also suffered during the Mingrelian Affair. For years historians erroneously thought that Kandid Charkviani was Mingrelian and that he was punished because of his links with Beria. However, the newly opened archives in Georgia provide evidence that Charkviani, who was Lechkhumian (from the Lechkhumi region of Georgia) and not Mingrelian or Svan, was accused because he allegedly failed to “detect and repress the criminal nationalist ring of counter revolutionaries within the ranks of the Georgian Communist Party”.[2] Moreover, it has emerged that Charkviani's relations with Beria had always been strained and that Beria tolerated Charkviani only because the latter was supported by Stalin. Immediately following Stalin's death, all Beria's clients who suffered during the Mingrelian Affair were restored. Yet Charkviani, on Beria's orders, was separated from his family and moved to Central Asia into exile.[3]
Many aspects of the Mingrelian Affair are still not completely understood. Beyond Stalin's growing distrust of his lieutenant Beria, who had particularly consolidated his positions after World War II, the affair also reflected a bitter power struggle among rival clans in the Communist élite of Georgia. It might also have echoed similar accusations of nationalism leveled against the Georgian "National Communists" in the 1922 Georgian Affair.
As a result of the events, Beria's power was reduced significantly in Georgia, but he still managed to retain his position in the Politburo. After Stalin's death in 1953, Beria managed to temporarily reinstate his clients in Georgia. However later many of them were prosecuted as the members of "Beria's gang".[citation needed]
The new Soviet leadership of Nikita Khrushchev admitted that the case was fabricated and eventually rehabilitated its victims.[citation needed][clarification needed]
References[edit]
- ^ Simon Sebag Montefiore, Stalin: Court of the Red Tsar, pp. 632-640.
- ^ Toma Chagelashvili's Project on Modern History of Georgia on the Rustavi 2 Channel, “Georgians in the Kremlin and Beyond” (5 parts) (in Georgian) "Rustavi 2". Archived from the original on 2008-06-14. Retrieved 2008-06-06..
- ^ Mikaberidze, Alexander, Candide Charkviani from the Dictionary of Georgian National Biography http://georgianbiography.com/alphabetindex.html#C.
Literature[edit]
- Suny, Ronald Grigor (1994), The Making of the Georgian Nation: 2nd edition, pp. 287–289. Indiana University Press, ISBN 0-253-20915-3.
- Lang, David Marshall (1962). A Modern History of Georgia, pp. 260–261. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson.
- Articles needing additional references from January 2022
- All articles needing additional references
- Articles with short description
- Short description with empty Wikidata description
- Articles containing Russian-language text
- Articles containing Georgian-language text
- All articles with unsourced statements
- Articles with unsourced statements from October 2015
- Justapedia articles needing clarification from October 2015
- Articles with invalid date parameter in template
- AC with 0 elements
- Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic
- Political and cultural purges
- Political repression in the Soviet Union
- 1951 in the Soviet Union
- 1952 in the Soviet Union