Georgia Remembers 1989's ‘Bloody Sunday'

On April 9, 1989, 21 people died in the Georgian capital of Tbilisi when Soviet police and military troops brutally stamped out peaceful demonstrations against the secession of the autonomous republic of Abkhazia from Georgia. For many Georgians, the date marks both a national tragedy and the moment when restoring this South Caucasus country’s statehood – lost after the Red Army’s 1921 invasion -- became no longer debatable. For others throughout the Soviet Union, the violence demonstrated that the Soviet system was beyond repair. In interviews with Current Time, a mother of one of the victims and participants in the protest reconstruct what happened.