title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili briefly worked as a human rights officer for the interim State Council of Georgia following the overthrow of President Zviad Gamsakhurdia before receiving a fellowship from the United States State Department (via the Edmund S. Muskie Graduate Fellowship Program). He received an LL.M. from Columbia Law School in 1994 and took classes at the School of International and Public Affairs and The George Washington University Law School the following year. In 1995, he also received a diploma from the International Institute of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili interned at the United Nations. After graduation, while on internship in the New York law firm of Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler in early 1995, he was approached by Zurab Zhvania, an old friend from Georgia who was working on behalf of President Eduard Shevardnadze to enter politics. He stood in the December 1995 elections along with Zhvania, and both men won seats in parliament, standing for the Union of Citizens of Georgia, Shevardnadze's party.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili was chairman of the parliamentary committee which was in charge of creating a new electoral system, an independent judiciary and a non-political police force. Opinion surveys recognised him to be the second most popular person in Georgia, behind Shevardnadze. He was named "man of the year" by a panel of journalists and human rights advocates in 1997. In January 2000, Saakashvili was appointed vice-president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 12 October 2000, Saakashvili became Minister of Justice for the government of President Shevardnadze. He initiated major reforms in the Georgian criminal justice and prisons system. This earned praise from international observers and human rights activists. But, in mid-2001, he became involved in a major controversy with the State Security Minister Vakhtang Kutateladze and Tbilisi police chief Ioseb Alavidze, accusing them of profiting from corrupt business deals.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili resigned on 5 September 2001, saying that "I consider it immoral for me to remain as a member of Shevardnadze's government." He declared that corruption had penetrated to the very centre of the Georgian government and that Shevardnadze lacked the will to deal with it, warning that "current developments in Georgia will turn the country into a criminal enclave in one or two years."


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Having resigned from the government and quit the Shevardnadze-run Union of Citizens of Georgia party, Saakashvili founded the United National Movement (UNM) in October 2001, a centre-right political party with a touch of nationalism, to provide a focus for part of the Georgian reformists leaders. In June 2002, he was elected as the Chairman of the Tbilisi Assembly ("Sakrebulo") following an agreement between the United National Movement and the Georgian Labour Party. This gave him a powerful new platform from which to criticize the government.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Georgia held parliamentary elections on 2 November 2003 which were denounced by local and international observers as being grossly rigged. Saakashvilli claimed that he had won the elections (a claim supported by independent exit polls), and urged Georgians to demonstrate against Shevardnadze's government and engage in nonviolent civil disobedience against the authorities. Saakashvili's UNM and Burdjanadze-Democrats united to demand the ouster of Shevardnadze and the rerun of the elections.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Massive political demonstrations were held in Tbilisi in November, with over 100,000 people participating and listening to speeches by Saakashvili and other opposition figures. The Kmara ("Enough!") youth organization (a Georgian counterpart of the Serbian "Otpor!") and several NGOs, like Liberty Institute, were active in all protest activities. After an increasingly tense two weeks of demonstrations, Shevardnadze resigned as president on 23 November, to be replaced on an interim basis by parliamentary speaker Nino Burjanadze. While the revolutionary leaders did their best to stay within the constitutional norms, many called the change of government a popular coup dubbed by Georgian media as the Rose Revolution.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili's "storming of Georgia's parliament" in 2003 "put U.S. diplomats off guard... [Saakashvili] ousted a leader the U.S. had long backed, Eduard Shevardnadze." Seeking support, Saakashvili went outside the U.S. State Department. He hired Randy Scheunemann, then Sen. John McCain's top foreign-policy adviser, as a lobbyist and used Daniel Kunin of USAID and the NDI as a full-time adviser.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 24 February 2004, the "United National Movement" and the "United Democrats" had amalgamated. The new political movement was named the National Movement - Democrats (NMD). The movement's main political priorities include raising pensions and providing social services to the poor, its main base of support; fighting corruption; and increasing state revenue.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: The 2004 presidential election were carried out on 4 January 2004. The election was an outcome of the bloodless Rose Revolution and a consequent resignation of President Eduard Shevardnadze. It is well known for a very high level of electoral turnout and also for the number of votes cast for one particular presidential candidate – Mikheil Saakashvili (96%). All other candidates received less than 2% of the votes. In total, 1,763,000 eligible voters participated in the election.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 4 January 2004, Saakashvili won the presidential elections in Georgia with more than 96% of the votes cast, making him at 36 years old, the youngest national president in Europe at the time. On a platform of opposing corruption and improving pay and pensions, he promised to improve relations with the outside world. Although he is strongly pro-Western and intended to seek Georgian membership of NATO and the European Union, he had also spoken of the importance of better relations with Russia. He faced major problems, however, particularly Georgia's difficult economic situation and the still unresolved question of separatism in the regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Abkhazia regards itself as independent of Georgia and did not take part in the elections, while South Ossetia favours union with its northern counterpart in Russia.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili was sworn in as president in Tbilisi on 25 January 2004. Immediately after the ceremony he signed a decree establishing a new state flag. On 26 January, in a ceremony held at the Tbilisi Kashueti Church of Saint George, he promulgated a decree granting permission for the return of the body of the first president of Georgia, Zviad Gamsakhurdia, from Grozny (Chechen Republic) to Tbilisi and renaming a major road in the capital after Gamsakhurdia. He also released 32 Gamsakhurdia supporters (political prisoners) imprisoned by the Shevardnadze government in 1993–94. As well as a new national flag, Saakashivili authorised the adoption of a new national anthem on 20 May 2004 and the establishment of a new state arms on 1 October 2004.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: In the first months of his presidency, Saakashvili faced a major political crisis in the southwestern Autonomous Republic of Adjara run by an authoritarian regional leader, Aslan Abashidze, who largely ignored the central Georgian government and was viewed by many as a pro-Russian politician. The crisis threatened to develop into an armed confrontation, but Saakashvili's government managed to resolve the conflict peacefully, forcing Abashidze to resign on 6 May 2004. Success in Adjara encouraged the new president to intensify his efforts towards bringing the breakaway South Ossetia back under the Georgian jurisdiction. The separatist authorities responded with intense militarization in the region, that led to armed clashes in August 2004. A stalemate ensued, and despite a peace plan proposed by the Georgian government in 2005, the conflict remains unresolved. In late July 2006, Saakashvili's government dealt successfully with another major crisis, this time in Abkhazia's Kodori Gorge where Georgia's police forces disarmed a defiant militia led by a local warlord Emzar Kvitsiani.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: In his foreign policy, Saakashvili maintained close ties with the US, as well as other NATO countries, and remains one of the key partners of the GUAM organization. The Saakashvili-led Rose Revolution has been described by the White House as one of the most powerful movements in the modern history that has inspired others to seek freedom.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: At the time Saakashvili took office, Georgia suffered from a stagnant economy, widespread corruption by police and state officials to the point where bribery was needed for any kind of commercial transaction, high crime rates, and severe infrastructure problems, including widespread power outages, and schools and medical facilities falling into disrepair. Saakashvili set out on a massive reform programme. He systematically fired politicians, public officials, and police officers suspected of corruption and significantly raised the salaries of state employees to the point where they could depend on their salaries rather than bribes for a living. Many oligarchs who had dominated the economy were arrested, with most agreeing to pay massive fines into the state budget in exchange for their freedom. Saakashvili reformed the economy by cutting red tape which had made business difficult, courting foreign investment, simplifying the tax code, launching a privatization campaign, and tackling widespread tax evasion. Due to the establishment of a functioning taxation and customs infrastructure, the state budget increased by 300% within three years. The government massively upgraded infrastructure and public services. In particular, water and power infrastructure was improved to the point where it functioned effectively, schools and hospitals were renovated, more roads were laid, and new housing developments were built.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: As a result, the rate of corruption in the country was drastically reduced and the business environment was improved significantly. The economy began growing and the standard of living rose. Georgia's ranking in the Corruption Perceptions Index by Transparency International improved dramatically from rank 133 in 2004 to 67 in 2008 and further to 51 in 2012, surpassing several EU countries. The World Bank named Georgia as the leading economic reformer in the world, and the country ranked 8th in terms of "ease of doing business"- while most of the country's neighbours are ranked somewhere in the hundreds. The World Bank noted a significant improvement in living conditions in Georgia, reporting that "Georgia's transformation since 2003 has been remarkable. The lights are on, the streets are safe, and public services are corruption free." Doing Business report founder Simeon Dyankov has given Georgia as an example to other reformers during the annual Reformer Awards.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Under Saakashvili's term, Georgia became involved in international market transactions to a small extent, and in 2007 Bank of Georgia sold bonds at premium, when $200m five-year bond was priced with a coupon of 9 per cent at par, or 100 per cent of face value, after initially being priced at 9.5 per cent and investors pushed orders up to $600m.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: In 2009, he introduced The Economic Liberty Act of Georgia, which was adopted by the Parliament of Georgia in 2011. The Act restricted the state's ability to interfere in the economy, and was aimed at reducing the state expenses and debt by 30% and 60%, respectively. It also explicitly prohibited the Government from changing taxes without a popular referendum on rates and structure.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Due to his government's economic reforms, Georgia's economy grew 70% between 2003 and 2013, and per capita income roughly tripled. However, poverty only marginally declined. At the end of his second term, about a quarter of the population was still poor, and unemployment was at 15%.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 27 March 2006, the government announced that it had prevented a nationwide prison riot plotted by criminal kingpins. The police operation ended with the deaths of 7 inmates and at least 17 injuries. While the opposition cast doubts over the official version and demanded an independent investigation, the ruling party was able to vote down such initiatives.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Despite this, Saakashvili's government also eased the legal system in some respects. His government decriminalized libel and pushed through legislation upholding freedom of speech, although he was accused of stifling the media and using the judicial system to go after his political opponents in spite of this. In December 2006, Saakashvili signed a constitutional amendment completely abolishing the death penalty in law.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili's government massively increased military spending to modernize the Georgian Armed Forces, which were small and poorly equipped and trained at the time he entered office. By 2007, the military budget had increased twenty-fold since 1999. New weapons and vehicles were purchased, military salaries were raised, new bases were built, and Georgian soldiers engaged in joint training exercises with the US military.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: When Saakashvili took office, the university entrance system was bribe-based, with a university spot costing up to $50,000 in 2003. His government introduced a common entrance exam, replacing the bribe-based system with a merit-based one. The quality of university education also improved. Despite this, Saakashvili was accused of failing to reform the quality of primary and secondary-level school education, which reportedly remained low at the end of his term in office.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: After Georgian independence, the government found that its Soviet-style centralized healthcare system was underfunded and failing. State-run centralized medical facilities were typically inefficient and in need of renovation and technological upgrades. As a result, the government privatized almost all public hospitals and clinics, and the insurance system was deregulated, with private insurance companies able to offer coverage. Only a few specialized facilities for mental health and infectious diseases remained in government hands, and the state continued to provide health insurance for those below the poverty line, whose insurance was paid for by public funds and provided by private insurers, and some civil servants, amounting to about 40% of the population. As a result, the level of healthcare greatly improved, with new hospitals and clinics beginning to replace older facilities. However, a portion of the population was left uninsured, as it could not afford private insurance and did not qualify for public insurance.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili sees membership of the NATO as a premise of stability for Georgia and offered an intensified dialogue with the "de facto" Abkhaz and Ossetian authorities. Until the 2008 South Ossetia war, a diplomatic solution was thought to be possible. Saakashvili's administration doubled the number of its troops in Iraq, making Georgia one of the biggest supporters of Coalition Forces, and keeping its troops in Kosovo and Afghanistan to "contribute to what it describes as global security".


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili's government maintained diplomatic relations with other Caucasian states and Eastern European countries with Western orientation, such as Armenia, Azerbaijan, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Turkey and Ukraine. In 2004, Saakashvili visited Israel to attend the official opening of the Modern Energy Problems Research Center, and Dr. Brenda Schaffer, the director of the centre, described Saakashvili as the Nelson Mandela of the 21st century. In August of the same year, Saakashvili, who holds an honorary doctorate from the University of Haifa, travelled to Israel to attend the opening of the official Week of Georgian-Jewish Friendship, held under the auspices of the Georgian president, for which the Jewish leaders were invited as honoured guests.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Relations with the United States were good, but were complicated by Saakashvili's "volatile" behaviour. Former and current US officials characterized the Georgian president as "difficult to manage". They criticized his "risky moves", moves that have often "caught the U.S. unprepared" while leaving it "exposed diplomatically".


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili's ties with the US go back to 1991 (see Early life and career). Biographies of Thomas Jefferson and John F. Kennedy can be found in his office, next to biographies of Joseph Stalin and Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and books on war. Seeking US support, Saakashvili went outside the United States Department of State and established contacts with Sen. John McCain and forces seeking NATO expansion.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili believes that the long-term priority for the country is to advance its membership in the European Community and during a meeting with Javier Solana, he said that in contrast with new and old European states, Georgia is an Ancient European state.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 10 May 2005, while U.S. President George W. Bush was giving a speech in Tbilisi's Freedom Square, Vladimir Arutyunian threw a live hand grenade at where Saakashvili and Bush were sitting. It landed in the crowd about from the podium after hitting a girl and did not detonate. Arutyunian was arrested in July of that year, but before his capture, he managed to kill one law enforcement agent. He was convicted of the attempted assassinations of Saakashvili and Bush and the murder of the agent, and given a life sentence.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: The late Georgian businessman Badri Patarkatsishvili claimed that pressure had been exerted on his financial interests after Imedi Television broadcast several accusations against officials. On 25 October 2007, former defence minister Irakli Okruashvili accused the president of planning Patarkatsishvili's murder. Okruashvili was detained two days later on charges of extortion, money laundering, and abuse of office. However, in a videotaped confession released by the General Prosecutor's Office on 8 October 2007, in which Okruashvili pleaded guilty to large-scale bribery through extortion and negligence while serving as minister, he retracted his accusations against the president and said that he did so to gain some political benefit and that Badri Patarkatsishvili told him to do so. Okruashvili's lawyer and other opposition leaders said his retraction had been made under duress.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Georgia faced the worst crisis since the Rose Revolution. A series of anti-government demonstration were sparked, in October, by accusations of murders and corruption levelled by Irakli Okruashvili, Saakashvili's erstwhile associate and former member of his government, against the president and his allies. The protests climaxed early in November 2007, and involved several opposition groups and the influential media tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili. Although the demonstrations rapidly went downhill, the government's decision to use police force against the remaining protesters evolved into clashes in the streets of Tbilisi on 7 November. The declaration of state of emergency by the president (7–16 November) and the restriction imposed on some mass media sources led to harsh criticism of the Saakashvili government both in the country and abroad. Human Rights Watch criticized the Georgian government for using "excessive" force against protesters in November and International Crisis Group warned of growing authoritarianism.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Patarkatsishvili's opposition television station Imedi was shut down in November 2007 after the authorities accused it of complicity with the plot to overthrow the elected government. The channel resumed broadcasts a few weeks after the incident, but did not cover news or talk shows until after the election. Subsequently, the station was sold to supporters of the Saakashvili government and some Georgian journalists have called for the station to be handed back.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 8 November 2007, President Saakashvili announced a compromise solution to hold early presidential elections for 5 January 2008. He also proposed to hold a plebiscite in parallel to snap presidential elections about when to hold parliamentary polls – in spring as pushed for by the opposition parties, or in late 2008. Several concessions in the election code were also made to the opposition.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 23 November 2007, the ruling United National Movement party officially nominated Saakashvili as its candidate for the upcoming elections. Pursuant to the Constitution of Georgia, Saakashvili resigned on 25 November to launch his pre-election campaign for early presidential polls.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 5 January 2008, an early presidential election was held nationwide, with the exception of the highland village of Shatili, where the polling station was not opened due to high levels of snowfall. In a televised address, President Saakashvili had proposed to hold the election earlier than called for by the Georgian constitution in order to resolve the political tension surrounding opposition-led demonstrations, their suppression by the government on 7 November 2007, and the closure of the most popular opposition television network, Imedi. Saakashvili said in his presidential address that "these elections will be held according to our timing, and not that of our ill-wishers."


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili publicly announced his plans of modernising the Cabinet of Georgia well before Georgian presidential elections. Shortly after being re-elected, the president formally re-appointed the Prime Minister of Georgia Lado Gurgenidze and asked him to present a renewed cabinet to the Parliament of Georgia for final approval.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Gurgenidze changed most ministers, leaving Ivane Merabishvili, controversial Minister for Home Affairs, Defence Minister David Kezerashvili and Minister of Finance Nika Gilauri on their former positions. Gia Nodia was appointed as the Minister of Education and Science. Zaza Gamcemlidze, former director of Tbilisi Botanic Garden, took over the position of the Minister of Natural Resources and Nature Protection. Famous archaeologist, and already the eldest minister in the cabinet, Iulon Gagoshidze was appointed on a newly designated position of the Minister of State for Diasporas.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Parliamentary elections held during Saakashvili's second term were condemned by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe election monitoring mission for being marred by ballot stuffing, violence against opposition campaigners, uncritical coverage of the president and his party from the state-controlled media, and public officials openly campaigning for the president's party.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 28 October 2008, Saakashvili proposed Grigol Mgaloblishvili, Georgian ambassador to Turkey for the premiership. According to the President, Gurgenidze had initially agreed to serve only for a year and that Georgia was facing new challenges which needed new approach. The Parliament of Georgia approved Mgaloblishvili as the premier on 1 November 2008.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 22 February 2008, Saakashvili held an official meeting with the President of Russia Vladimir Putin, in his residence in Novo-Ogaryovo. The presidents discussed the issues of aviation regulations between the two countries. This was Putin's last meeting in his second term as the President of Russia, being succeeded by Dimitry Medvedev shortly thereafter.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: However, after a series of clashes between Georgians and South Ossetians, Russian military forces intervened on the side of the South Ossetian separatists in response to the Georgian attack on Tskhinvali and invaded Gori in Shida Kartli. The two counterparts were led to a ceasefire agreement and a six-point peace plan, due to the French President's mediation. On 26 August 2008, the Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, signed a decree recognizing Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent states. Also on 26 August, in response to Russia's recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Deputy Foreign Minister Grigol Vashadze announced that Georgia had broken diplomatic relations with Russia.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev held Saakashvili responsible for the Russo-Georgian War, and states that Saakashvili is responsible for the collapse of the Georgian state. Medvedev has stated "(a)s soon as Georgia gets a new leader we will have every opportunity to restore ties."


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: The Georgian military's capabilities were severely damaged by the war, and Saakashvili's government moved to rebuild them, massively increasing military spending. By late 2010, the Georgian military reached a strength greater than that of pre-war levels, after which military spending declined again. Although the Georgian government bought large amounts of arms and military equipment from abroad, it also began to seriously invest in an indigenous military industry. Starting in 2010, Georgia began to manufacture its own line of armoured vehicles, artillery systems, small arms, and unmanned aerial vehicles.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: The pressure against Saakashvili intensified in 2009, when the opposition launched mass demonstrations against Saakashvili's rule. On 5 May 2009, Georgian police said large-scale disorders were planned in Georgia of which the failed army mutiny was part. According to the police, Saakashvili's assassination had also been plotted. Opposition figures dispute the claim of an attempted mutiny and instead say that troops refused an illegal order to use force against opposition demonstrators.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 2 October 2012, Saakashvili admitted defeat in Georgia's parliamentary election against Bidzina Ivanishvili in the election the day before. He was barred from seeking a third term in the 2013 presidential election. Saakashvili left Georgia shortly after the election.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: In December 2013, Saakashvili accepted the position of lecturer and senior statesman at Tufts University in the United States.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 23 March 2014, when Saakashvili was summoned to give testimony to the main prosecutor's office of Georgia, the office planned to interrogate him about the pardoning in 2008 of four high-ranking officials of the Department of Constitutional Security of the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs – Gia Alania, Avtandil Aptsiauri, Alexander Gachava and Mikhail Bibiluridze, who were convicted for causing the death of bank employee Sandro Girgvliani on 28 January 2006, as well as for unlawful actions against his friend Levan Bukhaidze. He was also to be questioned as a witness for nine criminal cases, including the death of the Prime Minister of Georgia Zurab Zhvania in 2005.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 28 July 2014, criminal charges were filed by the Georgian prosecutor's office against Saakashvili over allegedly "exceeding official powers" during the 2007 Georgian demonstrations, as well as a police raid on and "seizure" of Imedi TV and other assets owned by the late tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili. Saakashvili, then in Hungary, responded by accusing the Georgian authorities of political score-settling and attempts at appeasing Russia. The United States expressed concerns over the case and warned that "the legal system should not be used as a tool of political retribution". The European Union stated that it took "note with concern" and it will "closely monitor these and other legal proceedings against members of the former government and current opposition in Georgia".


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 2 August 2014, Tbilisi City Court ordered pre-trial detention in absentia for Saakashvili and the co-accused Zurab Adeishvili (chief prosecutor in 2007) and Davit Kezerashvili (defense minister in 2007), with a preliminary hearing appointed for September 2014.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 13 August 2014, Saakashvili was charged with embezzling budget funds. On 14 August, an internal search was declared, and on 31 August, the procedure for declaring an international search was launched. On 1 August 2015, Interpol refused to declare Saakashvili on the international wanted list, as the Georgian authorities demanded. In September, the property of the Saakashvili family was seized. His personal bank accounts in Georgia were also seized.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: In March 2015, Ukraine denied a Georgian request to extradite Saakashvili, as it deemed the criminal cases against him politically motivated.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili stated on 1 June 2015 that he had given up (three days before) Georgian citizenship to avoid "guaranteed imprisonment" in Georgia. The Constitution of Ukraine forbids the extradition of Ukrainians to other states.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 8 August 2017, the Georgian General Prosecutor's Office claimed Saakashvili would face up to 11 years of imprisonment (charges included the spending of public funding on personal needs, abuse of power during the dispersal of a demonstration on 7 November 2007, the beating of former MP Valery Gelashvili and the raid of Imedi TV).


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 18 August 2017, Georgia requested Ukraine to extradite Saakashvili. On 5 September, the Ukrainian authorities confirmed that they had received the request from Georgia.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 5 January 2018, the Tbilisi City Court sentenced Saakashvili to three-year imprisonment in absentia for abusing power in pardoning the former Interior Ministry officials convicted in the 2006 Sandro Girgvliani murder case. On 28 June 2018, the Tbilisi City Court found Saakashvili guilty of abusing his authority as president by trying to cover up evidence related to the 2005 beating of opposition lawmaker Valery Gelashvili and sentenced him in absentia to six years in prison. Saakashvili and his supporters denounced the verdict as politically motivated.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 24 March 2019, Saakashvili stepped down as the UNM party's chairman. He was succeeded by his own nominee, Grigol Vashadze.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili energetically supported Ukraine's Euromaidan movement and its Revolution of Dignity. On 7 March 2014, Saakashvili authored an op-ed piece entitled "When Putin invaded my country", in the context of the turmoil in Ukraine after the ouster on 22 February of President Viktor Yanukovych and before the 16 March referendum in the 2014 Crimean crisis.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 13 February 2015, Saakashvili was appointed by the president of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, as head of the International Advisory Council on Reforms—an advisory body whose main task is working out proposals and recommendations for implementation and introduction of reforms in Ukraine based on best international practices. On 30 May 2015, Poroshenko appointed Saakashvili Governor of Odesa Oblast (region). On the previous day, 29 May 2015, he was granted Ukrainian citizenship. A month before this appointment, Saakashvili had stated that he had turned down the post of First Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine because in order to fulfill that post, he would have had to become a Ukrainian citizen and renounce his Georgian citizenship. Saakashvili stated on 1 June 2015 that he had now changed his mind to avoid "guaranteed imprisonment" in Georgia and to defend Georgian interest through his governorship in Odesa. Also on 1 June, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Georgia stated that the appointment of Saakashvili would not have a negative impact on the relations between Georgia and Ukraine. But in reality, after this appointment, relations between the two countries soured. On 4 December 2015, Saakashvili was stripped of his Georgian citizenship. According to him, this was done to prevent him from leading the United National Movement in the 2016 Georgian parliamentary election.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: A poll by Sociological group "RATING" showed that in October 2015, Saakashvili was the most popular politician in Ukraine (43% viewed him positively).


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: In December 2015, Saakashvili started an anti-corruption NGO "Movement for Purification". Among rumours that this NGO would be transformed into a political force, Saakashvili stated he did not have the intention to create a new political party. In the autumn of 2015, informal attempts and negotiations were launched to form a political party around Saakashvili with members of the parliamentary group Interfactional Union "Eurooptimists", Democratic Alliance and possibly Self Reliance, but this project collapsed in June 2016.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili submitted his resignation as governor on 7 November 2016 citing corruption in Ukraine as a main reason. In a press conference this same day, he claimed that President Poroshenko personally supported "corruption clans in the Odesa region" and that the "Odesa region is being handed over not only to corrupt people, but also to enemies of Ukraine." On 9 November 2016, President Poroshenko accepted Saakashvili's resignation (as governor) and dismissed him as his freelance adviser.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 11 November 2016, Saakashvili announced his goal to create a new political party called "Movement of New Forces" and that "our goal is early parliamentary elections to be carried out as quickly as possible in the shortest possible time." In late February 2017, the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine registered Movement of New Forces officially as a political party.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 26 July 2017, President Poroshenko issued a decree stripping Saakashvili of his Ukrainian citizenship, but without a reason for his doing so being stated. Ukraine's migration service said in a statement that "according to the Constitution of Ukraine, the president takes decisions on who is stripped of Ukrainian citizenship based on the conclusions of the citizenship commission". Saakashvili, in response to his being stripped of citizenship, replied: "I have only one citizenship, that of Ukraine, and I will not be deprived of it! Now there is an attempt under way to force me to become a refugee. This will not happen! I will fight for my legal right to return to Ukraine!" A Ukrainian legislator from the Petro Poroshenko Bloc faction in parliament, Serhiy Leshchenko, said that Saakashvili was (when Poroshenko issued his decree) in the United States, but that if he sought to return to Ukraine, he would face extradition to Georgia to face charges for alleged crimes that occurred during his presidency there. According to "The Economist", most observers saw Poroshenko's stripping Saakashvili of his citizenship "simply as the sidelining of a political rival" (at the time political polls gave Saakashvili's political party Movement of New Forces around 2% in a hypothetical early election). On 28 July 2017, Saakashvili told "Newshour" he wanted to return to Ukraine to "get rid of the old corrupt elite" there.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 4 August, Saakashvili appeared in Poland; he left the country 4 days later travelling to Lithuania claiming "I'll be travelling across Europe." Saakashvili announced on 16 August that he will return to Ukraine on 10 September (2017) through the Krakovets checkpoint and urged people to meet him at the checkpoint.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 10 September, the train on which Saakashvili tried to enter Ukraine was held at a railway station in Przemysl, Poland. Then, on the same day, he travelled by bus to the Medyka-Shehyni border crossing, where he was allowed to pass through a Polish checkpoint on the border with Ukraine, but then temporarily blocked from reaching the Ukrainian checkpoint by a line of border guards standing arm-in-arm. Finally, a crowd broke through from the Ukrainian side and took Saakashvili into Ukraine. On 12 September, in the Leopolis Hotel in Lviv, the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine acquainted Saakashvili with the protocol on the administrative violation of "Illegal crossing or attempted illegal crossing of the state border of Ukraine."


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: At a rally in the western Ukrainian city of Chernivtsi on 13 September, Saakashvili announced that he would return to Kyiv on 19 September after travelling to several other cities to rally support.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 22 September, the Mostysky District Court of the Lviv region found Saakashvili guilty of illegally crossing the state border. Under the court's decision, he must pay a fine of 200 non-taxable minimums (3400 hryvni).


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: In the first half of 2017, and in December 2018 and January 2019, Saakashvili hosted political talk shows on the TV channel "Zik". Saakashvili claims his programme was axed in 2019 because his view on Yulia Tymoshenko's candidacy for the 2019 Ukrainian presidential election was distorted (he claimed to support her candidacy while his TV show suggested the exact opposite).


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 5 December 2017, Saakashvili (who was leading anti-government protests at the time) was temporarily detained by Ukraine's Security Service on the roof of his apartment building in central Kyiv and his apartment was searched. He was freed from police by a large group of protesters. Saakashvili's lawyer reported that the politician had been detained for attempting to overthrow Ukraine's constitutional system, whilst the SBU accused Saakashvili of receiving financing from a "criminal group" linked to ousted (during the Revolution of Dignity) Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych. On 8 December, General Prosecutor of Ukraine Yuriy Lutsenko announced that National Police officers had found the location of Saakashvili, detained him and placed him in a temporary detention centre. The following day, Saakashvili began an indefinite hunger strike, claiming to oppose any attempts at compulsory feeding. On 11 December, a Ukrainian court released him from detention.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 12 February 2018, Saakashvili was deported to Poland. The Ukrainian border service stated "This person was on Ukrainian territory illegally and therefore, in compliance with all legal procedures, he was returned to the country from where he arrived". Saakashvili was subsequently banned from entering Ukraine until 2021 by the Ukrainian border service. Saakashvili claimed that his Georgian bodyguards and supporters had in recent months been kidnapped, tortured and deported to Georgia. On 14 February 2018, Saakashvili showed up in the Netherlands, having been granted permanent residency there on the basis of family reunification.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: In May 2019, Ukraine's new president, Volodymyr Zelensky, restored Saakashvili's Ukrainian citizenship. On 29 May 2019, Saakashvili returned to Ukraine; but he soon stated that he had no political ambitions in Ukraine.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 4 June, Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko offered Saakashvili to join the leadership of his UDAR party and to take part in the July 2019 early parliamentary elections. Saakashvili turned down the offer. In these elections Saakashvili headed the party list of Movement of New Forces. The party received 0.46% of the total votes and no seats. Two days before the election, Saakashvili had called on his supporters to vote for the Servant of the People party at the election. (Servant of the People won the election with 43.16% of the votes.)


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili wrote it on his Facebook page on 22 April 2020 that he had received a proposal from President Zelensky to become Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine for reforms in the Shmyhal Government. Saakashvili told the Financial Times newspaper: "The president wants me to be in charge of talks with the IMF … I have experience." The Ukrainian parliament did not consider the issue at its meetings on 24 and 30 April 2020. On 7 May 2020, President Zelensky appointed Saakashvili head of the executive committee of the .


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 1 October 2021, Saakashvili claimed to have returned to Georgia after an eight-year absence, and called on his followers to march on the capital, Tbilisi. The Georgian police, however, claimed that Saakashvili had not crossed the country's border. He was arrested later on 1 October 2021 in Georgia, after illegally crossing the border. President of Georgia Salome Zourabichvili stated that she will "never" pardon Saakashvili. On 3 November 2021 Zourabichvili confirmed her first statement again.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili began a hunger strike in protest of the state's refusal to give him a fair trial on charges which he said would destroy him and Georgia. On 10 October 2021, his personal doctor asked authorities to move him to hospital as he continued with his hunger strike since his arrest and his health condition had allegedly worsened.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 14 October 2021, tens of thousands protested on Tbilisi's Rustaveli Avenue, demanding the release of Saakashvili from prison. Nika Melia, a leader of the United National Movement, came under criticism for ending a demonstration without presenting a plan of action or scheduling futher protests, some even questioning his ability to lead the party and his loyality to Saakashvili, pointing at the alleged internal power struggle within the party between Melia and Saakashvili. Melia responded to criticism by denying the existence of any conflict.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 8 November 2021, Saakashvili was moved to Gldani penitentiary hospital. On 9 November Amnesty International has uploaded statement on Twitter, about Saakashvili: "#Georgia: ex-President #Saakashvili (5th week of hunger strike) violently transferred to prison hospital; allegedly threatened; denied dignity, privacy & adequate healthcare. Not just selective justice but apparent political revenge."


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Georgia's rights ombudsman stated that Saakashvili was not being given proper medical care and was being abused by fellow inmates. On 18 November 2021, the U.S. State Department urged the Government of Georgia to treat Saakashvili fairly and guarantee his right to a fair trial, and also praised the independent medical team that criticized the prison conditions. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky also stated he would work to ensure Saakashvili's release, as Saakashvili is a Ukrainian citizen who was stripped of his Georgian citizenship in 2015.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili was taken to a Gori military hospital, against his wishes to be taken to a civilian hospital. According to Saakashvili's doctor Nokoloz Kipshidze and lawyer Nika Gvaramia as of 19 November 2021 he would end the 50-day hunger strike after the authorities agreed to take him to a hospital. On 12 December 2021, Otar Toidze, a doctor with Georgia's human rights commissioner said Saakashvili was in need of specialist treatment abroad. On 29 December 2021, he was taken from hospital to prison of Rustavi, according to oppositional leaders and media his health conditions were still bad, and he was still continuing decreasing weight, according to his lawyer Nika Gvaramia.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 28 June 2022 Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe has published declaration, in which they have said that Mikheil Saakashvili has to be treated immediately in a special institution abroad.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 1 December 2022, Saakashvili's lawyers appealed the court to either postpone Saakashvili's sentence or release him from prison on medical grounds.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: On 14 July 2005, businessman and Republican member of parliament Valery Gelashvili was beaten by unknown people. Gelashvili suffered skull trauma, numerous fractures of facial bones, lacerations in the nose and forehead, and fractures of the bones of the upper and lower jaw. The incident occurred after daily newspaper "Rezonansi" published interview with Gelashvili, in which he talked about a conflict between him and Saakashvili over the former's house and made comments about Saakashvili's personal life. In 2004, Gelashvili was requested by authorities to hand over his apartment building to the state after the government decided to transform the nearby Road Traffic Police building into the new presidential residence. Gelashvili agreed but requested the construction works of the new presidential residence to be carried out by his construction firm Evra. Gelashvili alleged in the interview that the government had not paid the firm for construction. He later blamed authorities and Saakashvili for ordering his attack. When the new government came into power in 2012, they promised to start investigation. On 28 June 2018, Tbilisi City Court sentenced former President Mikheil Saakashvili to six years in prison in absentia for, among other crimes, ordering the attack on Valeri Gelashvili in 2005. Saakashvili was also banned from taking any state post for two years and three months.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili received widespread criticism for his handling of the 2007 Georgian demonstrations, which were violently dispersed by the police using heavy-handed tactics. Saakashvili came under criticism for using rubber bullets and tear gas against protesters who were blocking Tbilisi's main transport artery, Rustaveli Avenue.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili has been accused of corruption and amassing wealth after coming into power by his political opponents. Although petty corruption in Georgia has been largely eliminated by the Saakashvili administration, it was alleged that elite corruption remained a significant problem. Alleged corruption in Saakashvili's inner circle was one of the main causes of 2007 Georgian demonstrations. Former Georgian Minister of Defense Irakli Okruashvili after his resignation accused Saakashvili of corruption and lobbying the interests of his own family. Okruashvili claimed that he caught the president's uncle with a $200,000 bribe but had to hush up the scandal at the president's request. It was alleged that Saakashvili's family members have acquired large number of state property by president's orders, and as a result, Saakashvili's family has emerged as one of the richest families in Georgia by the end of his second term. According to allegations, Saakashvili's family has taken over much of the higher education sector (his mother owning shares in several universities in Tbilisi), the spa industry and the advertisement sector. The opposition also accused then president Saakashvili of overseeing a system of elite corruption encompassing oil and minerals. Saakashvili denied accusations of his political opponents, claiming that his administration has been one of the most successful in eliminating corruption. He accused his opponents of spreading lies and not being honest. After leaving presidential post, Saakashvili has been charged by Prosecutor's Office of Georgia with illegal seizure of property and embezzlement of state funds. He and his supporters have denounced charges as politically motivated.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili is married to Dutch linguist Sandra Roelofs, whom he met in Strasbourg in 1993. The couple have two sons, Eduard and Nikoloz. A few days before Saakashvili's October 2021 return to Georgia he recorded a video on Facebook with Ukrainian MP Yelyzaveta Yasko in which they disclosed they were having a romantic relationship. A few days later Yasko remarked that Sandra Roelofs was Saakashvili's "ex-wife". There had been no media reports that Saakashvili and his spouse Roelofs had divorced. Roelofs had been "caught by surprise" by Yasko's and Saakashvili's video announcement and remarked on Facebook (on 7 October 2021) that "its form was absolutely unacceptable." On December 31, 2021, Saakashvili recognized to have an extramarital daughter, Elis-Maria, with singer Sofia Nizharadze calling her "my most lovely girl and youngest child".


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Apart from his native Georgian, Saakashvili speaks fluent English, French, Russian and Ukrainian, and has some command of Ossetian and Spanish.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Some non-Georgian sources spell Saakashvili's first name using the Russian spelling, "Mikhail". In Georgia, he is commonly known as "Misha", a hypocorism for Mikheil.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: In the 2010 study "Competitive Authoritarianism: Hybrid Regimes After the Cold War", political scientists Steven Levitsky and Lucan A. Way cite various media and human rights reports to describe Saakashvili's Georgia as a "competitive authoritarian" (i.e., a formally democratic but essentially non-democratic) state.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili's government has been lauded by the World Bank for making "striking improvements" in the fight against corruption. In addition, the US State Department noted that during 2005 "the government amended several laws and increased the amount of investigations and prosecutions reducing the amount of abuse and ill-treatment in pre-trial detention facilities". The status of religious freedom also improved due to increased investigation and prosecution of those harassing followers of non-traditional faiths.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: The scrupulousness of Patarkatsishvili's political opposition toward the Georgian president has been questioned by the Jamestown Foundation's political analyst Vladimir Socor who attributed the businessman's discontent to Saakashvili's anti-corruption reforms, which "had severely curtailed Patarkatsishvili's scope for doing business in his accustomed, post-Soviet 1990s-style ways." Patarkatsishvili—who had fled the Russian authorities after allegations of fraud—was called "a state criminal" by Saakashvili, who accused him of treason while refusing to admit to any of his accusations.


title: Mikheil Saakashvili

text: Saakashvili was portrayed by Cuban-American Hollywood actor Andy García in the 2010 Hollywood film "5 Days of War" by Finnish-American film director Renny Harlin. The film tells the story of Saakashvili and the events during the Russo-Georgian War.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The Mercedes-Benz W140 is a series of flagship vehicles manufactured by Mercedes-Benz from 1991 to 1998 in sedan/saloon and coupe body styles and two wheelbase lengths (SE and SEL). Mercedes-Benz unveiled the W140 S-Class at Geneva Motor Show in March 1991 with sales launch in April 1991 and North American launch on 6 August 1991.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: All models were renamed in June 1993 as part of the corporate-wide nomenclature changes for 1994 model year on, becoming S regardless of wheelbase length or body style as well as fuel type. Diesel models carried a TURBODIESEL trunk/boot lid label. In 1996, the S-Class coupé was renamed again as CL-Class into its own model range.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The W140 series S-Class was superseded by the W220 S-Class sedan and C215 CL-Class coupé in 1998 after an eight-year production run.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The development on the W140 began in 1981, with official introduction originally set in September 1989. Several different design proposals were studied from 1982 until 1986, when a definitive design proposal by Olivier Boulay was selected on 9 December 1986. Several engineering prototypes were evaluated from early 1987, with the final exterior design locked in September 1987. The design patents were filed on 23 February 1988 in West Germany and 23 August 1988 in the United States. The lead designer Bruno Sacco attributed Jaguar's XJ40 sedan and BMW's E32 7-Series as a major influence in W140 design. The initial exterior design proposal called for the two different cooling grille designs to denote the lower and upper model, similar to the idea of round and rectangle headlamps on the W123 (1976-1985). Innovative metal-forming technology allowed the extension of the engine hood/bonnet to the front bumper, with the grille placed inside the extruded metal. The W140 became the second model after the R129 (1989-2001) to have this extruded metal grille.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: When BMW introduced a new 7-Series (E32) in 1986, the first post-war German passenger V12 engine, M70, was offered. This surprise announcement forced Mercedes-Benz to delay the introduction of the W140 by eighteen months to 1991. The delay allowed Mercedes-Benz to develop the new V12 engine and to rearrange the engine bay to accommodate the gargantuan V12 engine along with upgrading the brake system. The final development prototypes were completed in June 1990, with pilot production models being built from June 1990 to January 1991.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The project cost overruns and eighteen-month delay resulted in the departure of Wolfgang Peter, Mercedes-Benz' chief engineer. The price of a W140 was considerably higher than its predecessor, the W126, (up to 25 per cent) leading to slow sales during the recession of 1990-1994.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The slow sales of the W140 can also be attributed to the wave of Japanese luxury cars that were introduced before the W140 was launched; while the base price of a six-cylinder 300SE was $71,500 in 1992, the Lexus LS400 started at $44,300, the Infiniti Q45 started at $43,600, and the Acura Legend started at $28,800. This led many prospective W140 buyers to switch to its competitors, due to their lower prices, lower maintenance costs, better reliability, and in the case of the LS400, an ownership experience that was just as good, if not better than its European competitors.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: As a result of the price increases and stiff competition, Mercedes-Benz shifted from "engineer's design" to "market-driven design" in the 1990s. Many enthusiasts argue that the W140 was the "last true S-class," as its successor, the W220, was criticized for having inferior engineering, and in the case of early models, poor reliability.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: Two engines, a stillborn V16 engine based on an elongated V12 engine and an 8.0 W18 engine meant for a hypothetical 800 SEL/S 800 were, again, developed in response to the purported rumour of BMW exploring a V16 engine and testing it in a 7-Series (E32) mule, named Goldfisch V16. The W18 did not proceed past the blueprint stage, but Mercedes-Benz had a small fleet of 85 W140 prototypes with V16 engines. Due to the increasing concern for climate protection and fear of sending a wrong message to the public in the early 1990s, the V16 engine was quietly cancelled.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: In March 1994, the updated W140 was unveiled at the 1994 Geneva Auto Salon and went on sale in April 1994.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: In 1995, the two tone exterior appearance was made to be monotone, low-beam xenon headlamps were added and the rear indicator lenses became clear. The change were later was introduced in June 1996 as 1996.5 models in Europe and 1997 models in the United States.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The W140 received notoriety in 1997 when Diana, Princess of Wales died in a car crash, involving an S 280 model, in a Paris tunnel.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The three body types are carried over from the W126: four-door sedan/saloon in two wheelbase lengths and one two-door coupé. The model types are assigned as W140 for standard wheelbase, V140 for long wheelbase, and C140 for coupé. In 1996, S-Class coupé was renamed as CL-Class and spun off from S-Class. A longer Pullman version with 4140 mm wheelbase was introduced in 1995 with two engine choices (S 500 Pullman and S 600 Pullman). The S 600 Pullman could be ordered with armour package.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The Sultan of Brunei ordered eighteen S 73 T station wagons/estates with AMG-prepared M 297 7.3-litre V12 engines putting out 391 kW (532 PS; 524 hp) and 750 N⋅m (553 lb⋅ft) to be built, with ten units delivered. The S 73 T had an S-Class coupé front end and the rear part of an S210 station wagon/estate installed, and rear lights of S-Class sedan.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: For the W140 series, a new generation of inline-6 and V8 petrol engines was developed with double-overhead camshafts (DOHC), four valves per cylinder, and new variable valve timing. Mercedes-Benz's first passenger V12 engine was introduced in 1991 in a response to BMW's 750i/750iL (E32). Only the 3.5-litre inline-6 diesel engine, OM 603.97x, was carried over from W126, and it remained the only engine in the W140 model range with a two-valves-per-cylinder format until its replacement in 1996. The advent of DOHC, with four valves per cylinder and accompanied by variable valve timing, helped to increase the horsepower and torque figures without imposing a heavy fuel-consumption penalty, all while reducing emissions. All petrol engines were equipped with catalytic converters during the entire W140 model run, regardless of where they were sold.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The 3.0-litre 24-valve inline 6, M 104.98x, was first introduced in 300 SL-24 and 300 E-24, 300 CE-24, and 300 TE-24 in 1989. This engine, fitted to 300 SE/300 SEL, had a very short run in W140; it was replaced by upgraded inline 6 engines introduced in 1993 with two displacements. The smaller 2.8-litre M 104.94x engine was fitted to 300 SE 2.8 (one year only) then S 280 (1994-1998). The larger 3.2-litre M 104.99x engine was fitted to 300 SE/300 SEL (one year only) then S 320 (1994–1998).


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The M 119 V8 engines were available in 4.2-litre (M 119 E 42) and 5.0-litre (M 119 E 50) versions and remained unchanged during its entire model run. In 1994, AMG developed a 6.0-litre version (M 119 E 60) with and in a very limited production for Japanese market. The S 500 AMG 6.0 and CL 500 AMG 6.0 were built from 1994 to 1999 per customer order. For 1993, the V8 engines were detuned for improved emission control.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The M 120 V12 engine was offered in 6.0 litres only for the entire model run. This engine developed 290–300 kW (394–408 PS; 389–402 hp) and 569–580 N⋅m (420–428 lb⋅ft) of torque for the 6.0-litre version. The 300 kW (408 PS; 402 bhp) version was available in Europe from 1991 to 1992 and in the United States for 1992 only. In 1993, the V12 was slightly detuned to 290 kW (394 PS; 389 bhp) for lower emission control. An AMG-prepared 6.0-litre M 120 V12 with higher performance rating, and , was only available for S- or CL-Class (C140) coupes and not S-Class sedans/saloons.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The 3.5-litre inline-6 diesel engine, OM 603.97x in the 300 SD TURBODIESEL (1991–1993) and S 350 TURBODIESEL (1994–1996) models was offered outside the North American and Japanese markets for the first time. This engine was replaced in 1996 by the entirely new 24-valve OM 606.961 ERE engine. This engine was loosely derived from the M 104 petrol engine, but with a different crankshaft and cylinder head. The smaller engine fitted to S 300 TURBODIESEL put out and . The fuel was delivered indirectly in the precombustion chamber before entering the combustion chamber.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: W140 remains the only S-Class to have wider range of transmissions during its eight-year run. The transmission choices at the introduction was 5-speed manual and 4-speed 4G-Tronic automatic. A new 5-speed 5G-Tronic was introduced in 1994 for inline 6 petrol engines only. In September 1995, 5G-Tronic was updated with electronic control for more optimal shifting points based on the sensor readings and became the sole automatic transmission option for the entire model range from 1996 to 1998.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The models equipped with inline 6 petrol engines have 5-speed manual transmission as standard with either 4-speed or 5-speed automatic transmission as extra-cost options, making W140 the last S-Class to have manual transmission. In June 1996, both 4-speed and 5-speed automatic transmissions were replaced by 5-speed electronically controlled automatic transmission. The inline 6 diesel engines were never offered with manual transmissions, following the "tradition" with W116 and W126. S 300 TURBODIESEL, introduced in 1996, received the 5-speed electronically controlled automatic transmission.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The models with V8 and V12 engines were offered with 4-speed automatic transmission as standard until August 1995. On September 1995, the 4-speed automatic transmission was replaced by 5-speed electronically controlled automatic transmission.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: 4MATIC, the all-wheel-drive system introduced in W124 (1985–1996), was never fitted to W140 S-Class. W140's successor, W220, became the first S-Class to have 4MATIC as extra-cost option.


title: Mercedes-Benz W140

text: The figures given for acceleration, top speed, and fuel consumption are combination of all types of transmission (5-speed manual, 4-speed automatic, 5-speed automatic, and 5-speed electronically controlled automatic) and three body types (standard, long, and coupé) wherever applicable.


title: Origami

text: ) is the Japanese art of paper folding. In modern usage, the word "origami" is often used as an inclusive term for all folding practices, regardless of their culture of origin. The goal is to transform a flat square sheet of paper into a finished sculpture through folding and sculpting techniques. Modern origami practitioners generally discourage the use of cuts, glue, or markings on the paper. Origami folders often use the Japanese word "" to refer to designs which use cuts.


title: Origami

text: On the other hand, in the detailed Japanese classification, origami is divided into stylized ceremonial origami (儀礼折り紙, "girei origami") and recreational origami (遊戯折り紙, "yūgi origami"), and only recreational origami is generally recognized as origami. In Japan, ceremonial origami is generally called "origata" () to distinguish it from recreational origami. The term "origata" is one of the old terms for origami.


title: Origami

text: The small number of basic origami folds can be combined in a variety of ways to make intricate designs. The best-known origami model is the Japanese paper crane. In general, these designs begin with a square sheet of paper whose sides may be of different colors, prints, or patterns. Traditional Japanese origami, which has been practiced since the Edo period (1603–1867), has often been less strict about these conventions, sometimes cutting the paper or using nonsquare shapes to start with. The principles of origami are also used in stents, packaging, and other engineering applications.


title: Origami

text: The Japanese word origami itself is a compound of two smaller Japanese words: "ori" (root verb "oru"), meaning to fold, and "kami", meaning paper. Until recently, not all forms of paper folding were grouped under the word origami. Before that, paper folding for play was known by a variety of names, including "orikata" or "origata" (折形), "orisue" (折据), "orimono" (折物), "tatamigami" (畳紙) and others.


title: Origami

text: Distinct paperfolding traditions arose in Europe, China, and Japan which have been well-documented by historians. These seem to have been mostly separate traditions, until the 20th century.


title: Origami

text: By the 7th century, paper had been introduced to Japan from China via the Korean Peninsula, and the Japanese developed "washi" by improving the method of making paper in the Heian period. The paper making technique developed in Japan around 805 to 809 was called "nagashi-suki (流し漉き)", a method of adding mucilage to the process of the conventional "tame-suki (溜め漉き)" technique to form a stronger layer of paper fibers. With the development of Japanese paper making technology and the widespread use of paper, folded paper began to be used for decorations and tools for religious ceremonies such as "gohei", "ōnusa" () and "shide" at Shinto shrines. Religious decorations made of paper and the way gifts were wrapped in folded paper gradually became stylized and established as ceremonial origami. During the Heian period, the Imperial court established a code of etiquette for wrapping money and goods used in ceremonies with folded paper, and a code of etiquette for wrapping gifts.


title: Origami

text: In the Muromachi period from the 1300s to the 1400s, various forms of decorum were developed by the Ogasawara clan and Ise clans (), completing the prototype of Japanese folded-paper decorum that continues to this day. The Ise clan presided over the decorum of the inside of the palace of the Ashikaga Shogunate, and in particular, Ise Sadachika () during the reign of the eighth Shogun, Ashikaga Yoshimasa (足利義政), greatly influenced the development of the decorum of the daimyo and samurai classes, leading to the development of various stylized forms of ceremonial origami. The shapes of ceremonial origami created in this period were geometric, and the shapes of "noshi" to be attached to gifts at feasts and weddings, and origami that imitated butterflies to be displayed on sake vessels, were quite different from those of later generations of recreational origami whose shapes captured the characteristics of real objects and living things. The "noshi" wrapping, and the folding of female and male butterflies, which are still used for weddings and celebrations, are a continuation and development of a tradition that began in the Muromachi period. A reference in a poem by Ihara Saikaku from 1680 describes the origami butterflies used during Shinto weddings to represent the bride and groom.


title: Origami

text: It is not certain when play-made paper models, now commonly known as origami, began in Japan. However, the "kozuka" of a Japanese sword made by Gotō Eijō (後藤栄乗) between the end of the 1500s and the beginning of the 1600s was decorated with a picture of a crane made of origami, and it is believed that origami for play existed by the Sengoku period or the early Edo period.


title: Origami

text: In 1747, during the Edo period, a book titled "Ranma zushiki" (欄間図式) was published, which contained various designs of the "ranma" (), an decoration of Japanese architecture. This included origami of various designs, including paper models of cranes, which are still well known today, and it is thought that by this time, many people were familiar with origami for play, which modern people recognize as origami. During this period, origami was commonly called orikata (折形) or orisue (折据) and was often used as a pattern on kimonos and decorations.


title: Origami

text: "Hiden senbazuru orikata ()", published in 1797, is the oldest known technical book on origami for play. The book contains 49 origami pieces created by a Buddhist monk named Gidō () in Ise Province, whose works were named and accompanied by "kyōka" (狂歌, comic "tanka") by author Akisato Ritō (秋里籬島). These pieces were far more technically advanced than their predecessors, suggesting that origami culture had become more sophisticated. Gido continued to produce origami after the publication of his book, leaving at least 158 highly skilled masterpieces for posterity. In 1976, Kuwana City in Mie Prefecture, Gido's hometown, designated 49 of the methods described in the "Hiden senbazuru orikata" as Intangible Cultural Properties of Kuwana City. Kuwana City has also certified as qualified persons who are able to correctly produce these works and have in-depth knowledge of the art. Kuwana City has published some of the origami production methods on YouTube.


title: Origami

text: From the late Edo period to the Bakumatu period, origami that imitated the six legendary Japanese poets, "rokkasen" (六歌仙) listed in the "Kokin Wakashū" (古今和歌集) compiled in the 900s and the characters in "Chūshingura" became popular, but today they are rarely used as subjects for origami.


title: Origami

text: In Europe, there was a well-developed genre of napkin folding, which flourished during the 17th and 18th centuries. After this period, this genre declined and was mostly forgotten; historian Joan Sallas attributes this to the introduction of porcelain, which replaced complex napkin folds as a dinner-table status symbol among nobility. However, some of the techniques and bases associated with this tradition continued to be a part of European culture; folding was a significant part of Friedrich Fröbel's "Kindergarten" method, and the designs published in connection with his curriculum are stylistically similar to the napkin fold repertoire. Another example of early origami in Europe is the "pajarita," a stylized bird whose origins date from at least the nineteenth century.


title: Origami

text: When Japan opened its borders in the 1860s, as part of a modernization strategy, they imported Fröbel's Kindergarten system—and with it, German ideas about paperfolding. This included the ban on cuts, and the starting shape of a bicolored square. These ideas, and some of the European folding repertoire, were integrated into the Japanese tradition. Before this, traditional Japanese sources use a variety of starting shapes, often had cuts, and if they had color or markings, these were added after the model was folded. In Japan, the first kindergarten was established in 1875, and origami was promoted as part of early childhood education. The kindergarten's 1877 regulations listed 25 activities, including origami subjects. "Shōkokumin" (小国民), a magazine for boys, frequently published articles on origami. "Origami Zusetsu" (折紙図説), published in 1908, clearly distinguished ceremonial origami from recreational origami. These books and magazines carried both the traditional Japanese style of origami and the style inspired by Fröbel.


title: Origami

text: In the early 1900s, Akira Yoshizawa, Kosho Uchiyama, and others began creating and recording original origami works. Akira Yoshizawa in particular was responsible for a number of innovations, such as wet-folding and the Yoshizawa–Randlett diagramming system, and his work inspired a renaissance of the art form. During the 1980s a number of folders started systematically studying the mathematical properties of folded forms, which led to a rapid increase in the complexity of origami models.


title: Origami

text: Starting in the late 20th century, there has been a renewed interest in understanding the behavior of folding matter, both artistically and scientifically. The "new origami," which distinguishes it from old craft practices, has had a rapid evolution due to the contribution of computational mathematics and the development of techniques such as "box-pleating", "tessellations" and "wet-folding". Artists like Robert J. Lang, Erik Demaine, Sipho Mabona, Giang Dinh, Paul Jackson, and others, are frequently cited for advancing new applications of the art. The computational facet and the interchanges through social networks, where new techniques and designs are introduced, have raised the profile of origami in the 21st century.


title: Origami

text: Many origami books begin with a description of basic origami techniques which are used to construct the models. This includes simple diagrams of basic folds like valley and mountain folds, pleats, reverse folds, squash folds, and sinks. There are also standard named bases which are used in a wide variety of models, for instance the bird base is an intermediate stage in the construction of the flapping bird.


title: Origami

text: Additional bases are the preliminary base (square base), fish base, waterbomb base, and the frog base.


title: Origami

text: Almost any laminar (flat) material can be used for folding; the only requirement is that it should hold a crease.


title: Origami

text: Origami paper, often referred to as "kami" (Japanese for paper), is sold in prepackaged squares of various sizes ranging from 2.5 cm (1 in) to 25 cm (10 in) or more. It is commonly colored on one side and white on the other; however, dual coloured and patterned versions exist and can be used effectively for color-changed models. Origami paper weighs slightly less than copy paper, making it suitable for a wider range of models.


title: Origami

text: Normal copy paper with weights of 70–90 g/m (19–24 lb) can be used for simple folds, such as the crane and waterbomb. Heavier weight papers of


title: Origami

text: 100 g/m (approx. 25 lb) or more can be wet-folded. This technique allows for a more rounded sculpting of the model, which becomes rigid and sturdy when it is dry.


title: Origami

text: Foil-backed paper, as its name implies, is a sheet of thin foil glued to a sheet of thin paper. Related to this is tissue foil, which is made by gluing a thin piece of tissue paper to kitchen aluminium foil. A second piece of tissue can be glued onto the reverse side to produce a tissue/foil/tissue sandwich. Foil-backed paper is available commercially, but not tissue foil; it must be handmade. Both types of foil materials are suitable for complex models.


title: Origami

text: Artisan papers such as unryu, lokta, hanji, gampi, kozo, saa, and abaca have long fibers and are often extremely strong. As these papers are floppy to start with, they are often backcoated or resized with methylcellulose or wheat paste before folding. Also, these papers are extremely thin and compressible, allowing for thin, narrowed limbs as in the case of insect models.


title: Origami

text: Paper money from various countries is also popular to create origami with; this is known variously as Dollar Origami, Orikane, and Money Origami.


title: Origami

text: It is common to fold using a flat surface, but some folders like doing it in the air with no tools, especially when displaying the folding. Some folders believe that no tool should be used when folding. However a couple of tools can help especially with the more complex models. For instance a bone folder allows sharp creases to be made in the paper easily, paper clips can act as extra pairs of fingers, and tweezers can be used to make small folds. When making complex models from origami crease patterns, it can help to use a ruler and ballpoint embosser to score the creases. Completed models can be sprayed so that they keep their shape better, and a spray is needed when wet folding.


title: Origami

text: In addition to the more common still-life origami, there are also moving object designs; origami can move. Action origami includes origami that flies, requires inflation to complete, or, when complete, uses the kinetic energy of a person's hands, applied at a certain region on the model, to move another flap or limb. Some argue that, strictly speaking, only the latter is really "recognized" as action origami. Action origami, first appearing with the traditional Japanese flapping bird, is quite common. One example is Robert Lang's instrumentalists; when the figures' heads are pulled away from their bodies, their hands will move, resembling the playing of music.


title: Origami

text: Modular origami consists of putting a number of identical pieces together to form a complete model. Often the individual pieces are simple, but the final assembly may be more difficult. Many modular origami models are decorative folding balls such as kusudama, which differ from classical origami in that the pieces may be held together using thread or glue.


title: Origami

text: Chinese paper folding, a cousin of origami, includes a similar style called golden venture folding where large numbers of pieces are put together to create elaborate models. This style is most commonly known as "3D origami". However, that name did not appear until Joie Staff published a series of books titled "3D Origami", "More 3D Origami", and "More and More 3D Origami". This style originated from some Chinese refugees while they were detained in America and is also called Golden Venture folding from the ship they came on.


title: Origami

text: Wet-folding is an origami technique for producing models with gentle curves rather than geometric straight folds and flat surfaces. The paper is dampened so it can be moulded easily, the final model keeps its shape when it dries. It can be used, for instance, to produce very natural looking animal models. Size, an adhesive that is crisp and hard when dry, but dissolves in water when wet and becoming soft and flexible, is often applied to the paper either at the pulp stage while the paper is being formed, or on the surface of a ready sheet of paper. The latter method is called external sizing and most commonly uses Methylcellulose, or MC, paste, or various plant starches.


title: Origami

text: Pureland origami adds the restrictions that only simple mountain/valley folds may be used, and all folds must have straightforward locations. It was developed by John Smith in the 1970s to help inexperienced folders or those with limited motor skills. Some designers also like the challenge of creating within the very strict constraints.


title: Origami

text: Origami tessellation is a branch that has grown in popularity after 2000. A tessellation is a collection of figures filling a plane with no gaps or overlaps. In origami tessellations, pleats are used to connect molecules such as twist folds together in a repeating fashion. During the 1960s, Shuzo Fujimoto was the first to explore twist fold tessellations in any systematic way, coming up with dozens of patterns and establishing the genre in the origami mainstream. Around the same time period, Ron Resch patented some tessellation patterns as part of his explorations into kinetic sculpture and developable surfaces, although his work was not known by the origami community until the 1980s. Chris Palmer is an artist who has extensively explored tessellations after seeing the Zilij patterns in the Alhambra, and has found ways to create detailed origami tessellations out of silk. Robert Lang and Alex Bateman are two designers who use computer programs to create origami tessellations. The first international convention devoted to origami tessellations was hosted in Brasília (Brazil) in 2006, and the first instruction book on tessellation folding patterns was published by Eric Gjerde in 2008. Since then, the field has grown very quickly. Tessellation artists include Polly Verity (Scotland); Joel Cooper, Christine Edison, Ray Schamp and Goran Konjevod from the USA; Roberto Gretter (Italy); Christiane Bettens (Switzerland); Carlos Natan López (Mexico); and Jorge C. Lucero (Brazil).


title: Origami

text: Kirigami is a Japanese term for paper cutting. Cutting was often used in traditional Japanese origami, but modern innovations in technique have made the use of cuts unnecessary. Most origami designers no longer consider models with cuts to be origami, instead using the term Kirigami to describe them. This change in attitude occurred during the 1960s and 70s, so early origami books often use cuts, but for the most part they have disappeared from the modern origami repertoire; most modern books don't even mention cutting.


title: Origami

text: Strip folding is a combination of paper folding and paper weaving. A common example of strip folding is called the Lucky Star, also called Chinese lucky star, dream star, wishing star, or simply origami star. Another common fold is the Moravian Star which is made by strip folding in 3-dimensional design to include 16 spikes.


title: Origami

text: Teabag folding is credited to Dutch artist Tiny van der Plas, who developed the technique in 1992 as a papercraft art for embellishing greeting cards. It uses small square pieces of paper (e.g., a tea bag wrapper) bearing symmetrical designs that are folded in such a way that they interlock and produce a three-dimensional version of the underlying design. The basic kite fold is used to produce rosettes that are a 3 dimensional version of the 2D design.


title: Origami

text: The basic rosette design requires eight matching squares to be folded into the 'kite' design. Mathematics teachers find the designs very useful as a practical way of demonstrating some basic properties of symmetry.


title: Origami

text: The practice and study of origami encapsulates several subjects of mathematical interest. For instance, the problem of "flat-foldability" (whether a crease pattern can be folded into a 2-dimensional model) has been a topic of considerable mathematical study.


title: Origami

text: A number of technological advances have come from insights obtained through paper folding. For example, techniques have been developed for the deployment of car airbags and stent implants from a folded position.


title: Origami

text: The problem of rigid origami ("if we replaced the paper with sheet metal and had hinges in place of the crease lines, could we still fold the model?") has great practical importance. For example, the Miura map fold is a rigid fold that has been used to deploy large solar panel arrays for space satellites.


title: Origami

text: Origami can be used to construct various geometrical designs not possible with compass and straightedge constructions. For instance paper folding may be used for angle trisection and doubling the cube.


title: Origami

text: Technical origami, known in Japanese as , is an origami design approach in which the model is conceived as an engineered crease pattern, rather than developed through trial-and-error. With advances in origami mathematics, the basic structure of a new origami model can be theoretically plotted out on paper before any actual folding even occurs. This method of origami design was developed by Robert Lang, Meguro Toshiyuki and others, and allows for the creation of extremely complex multi-limbed models such as many-legged centipedes, human figures with a full complement of fingers and toes, and the like.


title: Origami

text: The crease pattern is a layout of the creases required to form the structure of the model. Paradoxically enough, when origami designers come up with a crease pattern for a new design, the majority of the smaller creases are relatively unimportant and added only towards the completion of the model. What is more important is the allocation of regions of the paper and how these are mapped to the structure of the object being designed. By opening up a folded model, you can observe the structures that comprise it; the study of these structures led to a number of crease-pattern-oriented design approaches


title: Origami

text: The pattern of allocations is referred to as the 'circle-packing' or 'polygon-packing'. Using optimization algorithms, a circle-packing figure can be computed for any uniaxial base of arbitrary complexity. Once this figure is computed, the creases which are then used to obtain the base structure can be added. This is not a unique mathematical process, hence it is possible for two designs to have the same circle-packing, and yet different crease pattern structures.


title: Origami

text: As a circle encloses the maximum amount of area for a given perimeter, circle packing allows for maximum efficiency in terms of paper usage. However, other polygonal shapes can be used to solve the packing problem as well. The use of polygonal shapes other than circles is often motivated by the desire to find easily locatable creases (such as multiples of 22.5 degrees) and hence an easier folding sequence as well. One popular offshoot of the circle packing method is box-pleating, where squares are used instead of circles. As a result, the crease pattern that arises from this method contains only 45 and 90 degree angles, which often makes for a more direct folding sequence.


title: Origami

text: A number of computer aids to origami such as TreeMaker and Oripa, have been devised. TreeMaker allows new origami bases to be designed for special purposes and Oripa tries to calculate the folded shape from the crease pattern.


title: Origami

text: Copyright in origami designs and the use of models has become an increasingly important issue in the origami community, as the internet has made the sale and distribution of pirated designs very easy. It is considered good etiquette to always credit the original artist and the folder when displaying origami models. It has been claimed that all commercial rights to designs and models are typically reserved by origami artists; however, the degree to which this can be enforced has been disputed. Under such a view, a person who folds a model using a legally obtained design could publicly display the model unless such rights were specifically reserved, whereas folding a design for money or commercial use of a photo for instance would require consent. The Origami Authors and Creators group was set up to represent the copyright interests of origami artists and facilitate permissions requests.


title: Origami

text: However, a court in Japan has asserted that the folding method of an origami model "comprises an idea and not a creative expression, and thus is not protected under the copyright law". Further, the court stated that "the method to folding origami is in the public domain; one cannot avoid using the same folding creases or the same arrows to show the direction in which to fold the paper". Therefore, it is legal to redraw the folding instructions of a model of another author even if the redrawn instructions share similarities to the original ones, as long as those similarities are "functional in nature". The redrawn instructions may be published (and even sold) without necessity of any permission from the original author.


title: Origami

text: From a global perspective, the term 'origami' refers to the folding of paper to shape objects for entertainment purposes, but it has historically been used in various ways in Japan.


title: Origami

text: For example, the term 'origami' also refers to the certificate of authenticity that accompanies a Japanese sword or tea utensil. The people of the Hon'ami clan, who were the authority on Japanese sword appraisal from the Muromachi period to the Edo period, responded to the requests of the shogun, daimyo and samurai by appraising Japanese swords, determining when and by which school the sword was made, whether the inscription on the "nakago" was genuine or not, and what the price was, and then issuing origami with the results written on it. This has led to the Japanese word 'origami tsuki' (折り紙付き) meaning 'origami is attached' meaning that the quality of the object or the ability of the person is sufficiently high.


title: Origami

text: The term 'origami' also referred to a specific style of old documents in Japan. The paper folded vertically is called 'tategami' (竪紙), while the paper folded horizontally is called 'origami', and origami has a lower status than tategami. This style of letter began to be used at the end of the Heian period, and in the Kamakura period it was used as a complaint, and origami came to refer to the complaint itself. Furthermore, during the Muromachi period, origami was often used as a command document or a catalog of gifts, and it came to refer to the catalog of gifts itself.


title: The Masked Singer (American season 5)

text: The fifth season of the American television series "The Masked Singer" premiered on Fox on March 10, 2021, and concluded on May 26, 2021. The season was won by singer Nick Lachey as "Piglet", with singer JoJo finishing second as "Black Swan", and rapper Wiz Khalifa placing third as "Chameleon".


title: The Masked Singer (American season 5)

text: Singer-songwriter Robin Thicke, television and radio personality Jenny McCarthy Wahlberg, actor and comedian Ken Jeong, and recording artist Nicole Scherzinger all returned for their fifth season as panelists. The panelists once again competed for "The Golden Ear", with Jenny McCarthy Wahlberg winning for the second time. Regular host Nick Cannon tested positive for COVID-19 a few days before production was set to begin in February 2021; consequently, Niecy Nash guest hosted the first five episodes. Cannon returned after competing as "the Bulldog" in the fifth episode.


title: The Masked Singer (American season 5)

text: Guest panelists included Joel McHale in the third episode, Rita Wilson in the seventh episode, Chrissy Metz in the eighth episode, Rob Riggle in the ninth episode, Darius Rucker in the tenth episode, and season four winner LeAnn Rimes in the eleventh episode.


title: The Masked Singer (American season 5)

text: The season began with two groups of five, Group A and Group B. In a new twist, four wildcard contestants entered the competition beginning with the third episode, replacing previously eliminated contestants. The contestants among the season have a combined, "26 Grammy nominations, nine multi-platinum singles, four Oscar nominations, three Super Bowl appearances, six gold medals and two world records among them". In addition, the opening scene for the season premiere revealed that cast has, "a combined net worth over $600 million, eight marriages, 25 gold and platinum records, 459 tattoos, over 55 million records sold, over 198 million followers, three Grammy wins, three Emmy nominations, one Oscar win, nine divorces, and 146 toes."


title: The Masked Singer (American season 5)

text: This season featured a non-contestant masked character called "Cluedle-Doo". Over the course of 10 episodes, Cluedle-Doo periodically disrupted the broadcast to provide additional clues to the audience from his secret studio, teasing the host and panelists, while challenging the audience to discover who he was. In the semi-final episode, he appeared in person to perform "Return of the Mack" by Mark Morrison for the panel, then challenged them to guess his identity. After the panelists made their guesses who he was, none of which was correct, he unmasked himself as singer Donnie Wahlberg, panelist Jenny McCarthy Wahlberg's husband, shocking McCarthy Wahlberg who did not recognize his voice.


title: The Masked Singer (American season 5)

text: Kermit the Frog ("Snail") is the first fictional character to have competed on the American version of "The Masked Singer" and "Russian Dolls" (Hanson) are the second costume to feature more than one person (the first being Clint and Lisa Black's "Snow Owls" costume from the previous season) and the first costume to feature a group of different celebrities.


title: Hack and slash

text: Hack and slash, also known as hack and slay (H&S or HnS) or slash 'em up, refers to a type of gameplay that emphasizes combat with melee-based weapons (such as swords or blades). They may also feature projectile-based weapons as well (such as guns) as secondary weapons. It is a sub-genre of beat 'em up games, which focuses on melee combat usually with swords. Hack-and-slash action games are sometimes known as character action games.


title: Hack and slash

text: The term "hack and slash" was originally used to describe a play style in tabletop role-playing games, carrying over from there to MUDs, MMORPGs, and role-playing video games. In arcade and console style action video games, the term has an entirely different usage, specifically referring to action games with a focus on real-time combat with hand-to-hand weapons as opposed to guns or fists. The two types of hack-and-slash games are largely unrelated, though action role-playing games may combine elements of both.


title: Hack and slash

text: In the context of action video games, the terms "hack and slash" or "slash 'em up" refer to melee weapon-based action games that are a sub-genre of beat 'em ups. Traditional 2D side-scrolling examples include Taito's "The Legend of Kage" (1985) and "Rastan" (1987), Sega's arcade video game series "Shinobi" (1987 debut) and "Golden Axe" (1989 debut), Data East's arcade game "Captain Silver" (1987), Tecmo's early "Ninja Gaiden" ("Shadow Warriors") 2D games (1988 debut), Capcom's "Strider" (1989), the Sega Master System game "" (1990), Taito's "Saint Sword" (1991), Vivid Image's home computer game "First Samurai" (1991), and Vanillaware's "Dragon's Crown" (2013). The term "hack-and-slash" in reference to action-adventure games dates back to 1987, when "Computer Entertainer" reviewed "The Legend of Zelda" and said it had "more to offer than the typical hack-and-slash" epics.


title: Hack and slash

text: In the early 21st century, journalists covering the video game industry often use the term "hack and slash" to refer to a distinct genre of 3D, third-person, weapon-based, melee action games. Examples include Capcom's "Devil May Cry", "Onimusha", and "Sengoku Basara" franchises, Koei Tecmo's "Dynasty Warriors" and 3D "Ninja Gaiden" games, Sony's "" and "God of War", as well as "Bayonetta", "Darksiders", "Dante's Inferno", and "No More Heroes". The genre is sometimes known as "character action" games, and represent a modern evolution of traditional arcade action games. This subgenre of games was largely defined by Hideki Kamiya, creator of "Devil May Cry" and "Bayonetta". In turn, "Devil May Cry" (2001) was influenced by earlier hack-and-slash games including "" (2001) and "Strider".


title: Hack and slash

text: The term "hack and slash" itself has roots in "pen and paper" RPGs such as "Dungeons & Dragons", denoting campaigns of violence with no other plot elements or significant goal. The term itself dates at least as far back as 1980, as shown in a "Dragon" article by Jean Wells and Kim Mohan which includes the following statement: "There is great potential for more than hacking and slashing in "D&D" or "AD&D"; there is the possibility of intrigue, mystery and romance involving both sexes, to the benefit of all characters in a campaign."<ref name="Wells/Mohan"></ref>


title: Hack and slash

text: Hack and slash made the transition from the tabletop to role-playing video games, usually starting in "D&D"-like worlds. This form of gameplay influenced a wide range of action role-playing games, including games such as "Xanadu" and "Diablo".


title: Dunkirk

text: Dunkirk ( ; ; ; , ;) is a commune in the department of Nord in northern France. It lies from the Belgian border. It has the third-largest French harbour. The population of the commune in 2019 was 86,279.


title: Dunkirk

text: The name of Dunkirk derives from West Flemish 'dune' or 'dun' and 'church', thus 'church in the dunes'. A smaller town 25 km farther up the Flemish coast originally shared the same name, but was later renamed Oostduinkerke(n) in order to avoid confusion.


title: Dunkirk

text: Until the middle of the 20th century, French Flemish (the local variety of Dutch) was commonly spoken.


title: Dunkirk

text: A fishing village arose late in the tenth century, in the originally flooded coastal area of the English Channel south of the Western Scheldt, when the area was held by the Counts of Flanders, vassals of the French Crown. About AD 960, Count Baldwin III had a town wall erected in order to protect the settlement against Viking raids. The surrounding wetlands were drained and cultivated by the monks of nearby Bergues Abbey. The name "Dunkirka" was first mentioned in a tithe privilege of 27 May 1067, issued by Count Baldwin V of Flanders. Count Philip I (1157–1191) brought further large tracts of marshland under cultivation, laid out the first plans to build a Canal from Dunkirk to Bergues and vested the Dunkirkers with market rights.


title: Dunkirk

text: In the late 13th century, when the Dampierre count Guy of Flanders entered into the Franco-Flemish War against his suzerain King Philippe IV of France, the citizens of Dunkirk sided with the French against their count, who at first was defeated at the 1297 Battle of Furnes, but reached "de facto" autonomy upon the victorious Battle of the Golden Spurs five years later and exacted vengeance. Guy's son, Count Robert III (1305–1322), nevertheless granted further city rights to Dunkirk; his successor Count Louis I (1322–1346) had to face the Peasant revolt of 1323–1328, which was crushed by King Philippe VI of France at the 1328 Battle of Cassel, whereafter the Dunkirkers again were affected by the repressive measures of the French king.


title: Dunkirk

text: Count Louis remained a loyal vassal of the French king upon the outbreak of the Hundred Years' War with England in 1337, and prohibited the maritime trade, which led to another revolt by the Dunkirk citizens. After the count had been killed in the 1346 Battle of Crécy, his son and successor Count Louis II of Flanders (1346–1384) signed a truce with the English; the trade again flourished and the port was significantly enlarged. However, in the course of the Western Schism from 1378, English supporters of Pope Urban VI (the Roman claimant) disembarked at Dunkirk, captured the city and flooded the surrounding estates. They were ejected by King Charles VI of France, but left great devastations in and around the town.


title: Dunkirk

text: Upon the extinction of the Counts of Flanders with the death of Louis II in 1384, Flanders was acquired by the Burgundian, Duke Philip the Bold. The fortifications were again enlarged, including the construction of a belfry daymark (a navigational aid similar to a non-illuminated lighthouse). As a strategic point, Dunkirk has always been exposed to political greed, by Duke Robert I of Bar in 1395, by Louis de Luxembourg in 1435 and finally by the Austrian archduke Maximilian I of Habsburg, who in 1477 married Mary of Burgundy, sole heiress of late Duke Charles the Bold. As Maximilian was the son of Emperor Frederick III, all Flanders was immediately seized by King Louis XI of France. However, the archduke defeated the French troops in 1479 at the Battle of Guinegate. When Mary died in 1482, Maximilian retained Flanders according to the terms of the 1482 Treaty of Arras. Dunkirk, along with the rest of Flanders, was incorporated into the Habsburg Netherlands and upon the 1581 secession of the Seven United Netherlands, remained part of the Southern Netherlands, which were held by Habsburg Spain (Spanish Netherlands) as Imperial fiefs.