Gegechkori Evgeni

Evgeni Gegechkori (January 20, 1881, Martvili – June 5, 1954, Paris) was a political, state, and public figure, and one of the Social-Democratic Leaders of Georgia. He was a lawyer and a publicist. He was elected as a member of the Third State Duma (1907–1912) from the Kutaisi Governorate, where he was one of the leaders of the Social-Democratic faction. After the February Revolution of 1917, in April, he was elected head of the unified center of the Caucasian Army’s Regional Council and the Workers’ Deputies’ Regional Council.

From November 1917 to April 1918, he served as head of the Transcaucasian Commissariat and Minister of Labor, and also as the head of the government of the Transcaucasian Seim. Gegechkori, due to the national policy of the Social Democrats, was one of the individuals who refused to send representatives to the Brest-Litovsk peace negotiations, which harmed Georgia's interests. In March 1918, he refused to recognize the Brest-Litovsk peace treaty. From 1917 to 1921, he was a member of the Georgian National Council (parliament) and Constituent Assembly of Georgia. From 1918, he served as the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Democratic Republic of Georgia. He played a role in the signing of the Georgia-Russia peace treaty on May 7, 1920. In 1920, he traveled to Europe to ensure that European states recognized the Democratic Republic of Georgia.

On March 21, 1919, when the Constituent Assembly of Georgia approved the country’s new Social-Democrat government, Gegechkori assumed the position of the Minister of Justice as well. However, in 1920, when the ministry of Justice formed as a separate entity, J. Arsenisdze took over this position.

Gegechkori was abroad when the Soviet army occupied Georgia in February-March of 1921. He joined the Georgian political emigration in exile.

He is buried in France, at the Leuville Cemetery.

Literature: შარაძე გ., უცხოეთის ცის ქვეშ, წგ. 3, თბ., 1993.

U. Sidamonidze