Former Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze thanked ex-Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev on Tuesday for selecting him for the post of Soviet Foreign Minister in 1985.
Gorbachev, whose brave attempts to reform the crumbling Soviet system led instead to its downfall, celebrates his 80th birthday on March 2.
"He [Gorbachev] summonded me directly to the Politburo and said that now we need not a diplomat, but a politician, who knows what Perestroika is and what reform is," Shevardnadze said. "I became a minister, and not a bad one."
"I'm grateful to him for that choice. As foreign minister I went to over 70 countries, travelled the whole world and learned so much thanks to Gorbachev," he added.
TBILISI, March 1 (RIA Novosti, Elena Partsvaniya)
