Noe Khomeriki (January 1, 1883 — September 1, 1924) was a Georgian

Georgia (country)

Georgia is a sovereign state in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the southwest by Turkey, to the south by Armenia, and to the southeast by Azerbaijan. The capital of...

 politician involved in the Social Democrat

Social democracy

Social democracy is a political ideology of the center-left on the political spectrum. Social democracy is officially a form of evolutionary reformist socialism. It supports class collaboration as the course to achieve socialism...

 movement and shot during the Bolshevik

Bolshevik

The Bolsheviks, originally also Bolshevists , derived from bol'shinstvo, "majority") were a faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party which split apart from the Menshevik faction at the Second Party Congress in 1903....

 Red Terror

Red Terror

The Red Terror in Soviet Russia was the campaign of mass arrests and executions conducted by the Bolshevik government. In Soviet historiography, the Red Terror is described as having been officially announced on September 2, 1918 by Yakov Sverdlov and ended about October 1918...

 in the Georgian SSR.

Born in the province of Guria

Guria

Guria is a region in Georgia, in the western part of the country, bordered by the eastern end of the Black Sea. The region has a population of 143,357 and Ozurgeti is a regional capital.-Geography:...

 (then part of Kutais Governorate, Imperial Russia), he engaged in local peasant movement and was a member of the Georgian Social Democratic (Menshevik) Party

Georgian Social Democratic (Menshevik) Party

200px|thumb|Menshevik Flag of Georgia, created by Iakob NikoladzeThe Social Democratic Labour Party of Georgia was a political party in Georgia. It was founded as the Georgian branch of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party separated itself from the Russian mother-party.The party dominated...

. He played a prominent role in the 1903-06 Gurian Republic

Gurian Republic

The Gurian Republic or the Gurian peasant republic is a conventional term used to denote the revolutionary events that took place in the western Georgian province Guria prior to and during the Russian Revolution of 1905....

, the first social-democratic self-governing territory within the Russian Empire. After the Russian Revolution of 1917

Russian Revolution of 1917

The Russian Revolution is the collective term for a series of revolutions in Russia in 1917, which destroyed the Tsarist autocracy and led to the creation of the Soviet Union. The Tsar was deposed and replaced by a provisional government in the first revolution of February 1917...

, Georgia became an independent democratic republic

Democratic Republic of Georgia

The Democratic Republic of Georgia , 1918–1921, was the first modern establishment of a Republic of Georgia.The DRG was created after the collapse of the Russian Empire that began with the Russian Revolution of 1917...

 in 1918 and Khomeriki was elected to the Constituent Assembly of Georgia

Constituent Assembly of Georgia

The Constituent Assembly of Georgia was a national legislature of the Democratic Republic of Georgia which was elected in February 1919 to ratify the Act of Independence of Georgia and enact the Constitution of 1921...

. He then assumed the position of Minister for Agriculture in the Georgian government. During his tenure, Khomeriki authored a successful land reform (January 1919), which redistributed the land as private property, retaining only forests, rivers and some pastureland as state property. The Red Army invasion

Red Army invasion of Georgia

The Red Army invasion of Georgia also known as the Soviet–Georgian War or the Soviet invasion of Georgia was a military campaign by the Soviet Russian Red Army against the Democratic Republic of Georgia aimed at overthrowing the Social-Democratic government and installing the Bolshevik regime...

 forced the Georgian cabinet into exile to France

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 where Khomeriki remained a member of the Government of the Democratic Republic of Georgia in exile

Government of the Democratic Republic of Georgia in Exile

The Government of the Democratic Republic of Georgia continued to function as the government in exile after the Soviet Russian Red Army invaded Georgia and the Bolsheviks took over the country early in 1921....

. In 1922, he secretly returned to Georgia to supervise the Committee for Independence of Georgia

Committee for Independence of Georgia

The Committee for the Independence of Georgia or the Parity Committee was an underground anti-Soviet organization active in the Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic in the early 1920s. It is commonly known as "Damkom"...

, an underground anti-Soviet organization. However, he was arrested by the Cheka

Cheka

Cheka was the first of a succession of Soviet state security organizations. It was created by a decree issued on December 20, 1917, by Vladimir Lenin and subsequently led by aristocrat-turned-communist Felix Dzerzhinsky...

 in 1923 and shot during the 1924 purge in Georgia.

Works

• N. Khomeriki, La Réforme agraire et l’économie rurale en Géorgie: Rapport au Congrès du Parti Social-Democrate de Géorgie, en juillet 1920 (Paris, 1921).

Quotes

• "Comrade Koba told you that we were against you and demanded your sacking from the Committee, but I promise nothing of the sort happened and everything Koba told you was a malicious lie! Yes: a calumny to discredit us! I just wonder at the man's impudence. I know how worthless he is, but I didn't expect such 'courage.' But it turns out that he'll use any means if he thinks the ends justify them. The end in this case - the ambition - is to present himself as a great man before the nation. But... God didn't grant him the right gifts, so he has to resort to intrigues, lies and other 'bagatelles.' Such a filthy person wanted to pollute our sacred mission with sewage!"

--Khomeriki's assessment of Joseph Stalin

Joseph Stalin

Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...

 in a 1904 letter to a member of the Social Democratic Central Committee for the Caucausus region. Quoted by Simon Sebag Montefiore

Simon Sebag Montefiore

Simon Jonathan Sebag Montefiore is a British historian and writer.-Family history:Simon's father, a doctor, is descended from a famous line of wealthy Sephardic Jews who became diplomats and bankers all over Europe...

, Young Stalin, page 125.