SUSPECT OF ATTACK ON BUSH TAKEN INTO CUSTODY IN GEORGIA

PanARMENIAN.Net - Yesterday a suspect of an attack on George Bush was taken into custody in Georgia. He appeared to be a certain Vladimir Harutyunyan, Georgian Minister of Internal Affairs Vano Merabishvili stated in the course of a news conference. He said the thrower of the grenade was arrested owing to vigilance of citizens, who identified the person they knew owing to an identikit. The operation was held at the Vashlijvari Tbilisi district. Harutyunyan showed armed resistance during the arrest. Chief of the Counterespionage Department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIF) of Georgia Zurab Kvlividze was killed in the skirmish. As reported by RIA Novosti, the suspect was wounded as well. Harutyunyan, 27, is unemployed. It should be reminded that a grenade was thrown on the US President, when he was delivering a speech in the Liberty Square in Tbilisi. V. Harutyunyan is at Republican Hospital of Georgia at the moment. He was operated last night. Surgeons have cleansed the fire wounds in his shoulder and leg he got in the course of the arrest. "The state of Harutyunyan is stable. There is no threat to his life," MIF Press Service head Guram Donadze told journalists. The Republican Hospital is cordoned off by police. The press is not allowed into the hospital, physicians refuse conversations with journalists by phone. Components of blasting systems were discovered at Harutyunyan's house, reported the Georgian MIF. Police officers and crime detection specialists continued working in Harutyunyan's house all night long. Detonators, chemical agents and special facilities for making explosive assemblies were discovered in the suspect's flat and the cellarage. Besides, according to the MIF sources, during the first contact with policemen, who made an ambush in the house porch, Harutyunyan tried to blow up a grenade, but it slipped out of his hands.