Tens of thousands of demonstrators have challenged U.S.-allied Mikhail Saakashvili's victory in Georgia's presidential election, protesting what they called massive official fraud and urging a recount, followed by a runoff between Saakashvili and his top challenger.
The rally, which attracted more than 60,000 demonstrators Sunday, reflected broad disillusionment with Saakashvili. And it raised fears of continuing instability in the strategically placed ex-Soviet nation of 4.6 million where Russia and the United States have been vying for influence.
Wearing white scarves symbolic of the opposition and chanting anti-Saakashvili slogans, protesters braving subfreezing temperatures marched for several hours across downtown Tbilisi. Organizers said about 100,000 turned out.
The protesters demanded a runoff of the Jan. 5 election in which Saakashvili won his second term by receiving, the government contends, more than 50 percent of the vote.
The rally was a dramatic turnaround from mass protests in 2003 that were called the Rose Revolution. Those demonstrations catapulted Saakashvili into the presidency. Many opposition leaders were previously Saakashvili's allies.
"Misha the Rose, you will fall soon!" protesters shouted, calling the president by his nickname in a chant that referred to the Rose Revolution.
Final results released Sunday showed Saakashvili with 53.47 percent of the vote, while opposition leader Levan Gachechiladze had 25.67 percent.
The observer mission of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, the main trans-Atlantic security and rights organization, gave the election a mixed assessment.
It called the vote a "triumphant step" for democracy in Georgia, but pointed to an array of violations.
Participants in Sunday's rally carried slogans in English which read: "OSCE backs rigged elections" and "U.S.A. supporter of dictatorship." Some demonstrators accused the United States of turning a blind eye to vote fraud.
Gachechiladze and his supporters denounced the official count as a sham, saying it was the result of a systematic government effort to rig the vote. They said election officials responsible for ballot tinkering must be prosecuted and a runoff involving Saakashvili and Gachechiladze be held.
"Georgia doesn't have a legitimate president," Gachechiladze said at the rally. "If we stand together, we will win."
He and other opposition leaders also demanded regular access to state television, which has focused on covering Saakashvili and his allies.
"Misha, go away!" the protesters chanted as they marched across the downtown Georgian capital before wrapping up their rally on a central square near the parliament building. Some shouted "Satan!"
Police did not intervene.
The controversy stoked concerns about potential violence in Georgia, which sits on an oil pipeline carrying Caspian crude to Western markets.
Saakashvili, a 40-year old U.S.-educated lawyer, was elected by a landslide in January 2004 in the wake of the Rose Revolution protests which ousted his predecessor.
He has helped transform Georgia into a country with a growing economy and aspirations of joining the European Union and NATO. But his popularity has plunged amid the government's failure to ease poverty and accusations of authoritarianism.
A brutal police crackdown on an opposition rally in Tbilisi on Nov. 7 caused public anger and drew criticism from Western governments. Saakashvili called the early presidential vote to assuage tensions.
The opposition said it had been deprived of fair access to television during the campaign and pointed at what it said was evidence of widespread official falsification with ballots throughout. It claimed that Saakashvili in fact fell far short of the 50 percent majority needed for a first round victory and must face a runoff with Gachechiladze.
"No one except international monitors has the slightest doubt that the vote was rigged," said one of the demonstrators, Georgy Kadagidze, a 47-year old physicist. "If Saakashvili is so confident of his victory, why not have a recount?"
Another opposition supporter, Isa Mamedov, 38 from the Marneuli region mostly populated by ethnic Azerbaijanis, said he was stunned by official results which showed Saakashvili winning almost all of the vote there.
"It's all lies, our votes have been stolen," Mamedov said.
Opposition leaders accused Saakashvili of forcing prominent businessmen to deny financial assistance to the opposition. "Many businessmen in Georgia are practically Saakashvili's slaves," said Zviad Dzidziguri, the leader of the opposition Conservative Party.
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