TBILISI -- An angry mob swarmed the house of Georgian activist Nata Peradze on January 10 after she posted a video online showing blue paint splattered on an icon of St. Matrona of Moscow in Tbilisi's Holy Trinity Cathedral that had recently sparked controversy because it carries an image of the Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.
It was initially unclear whether Peradze had defaced the icon, but as activists of the pro-Russia Alt-Info group gathered outside her home and loudly accused her of "insulting the icon," she admitted she threw the paint.
"I really did not expect a reaction like this," Peradze told RFE/RL. "I anticipated some response when I took this action.... The reactions exceeded all my expectations."
The crowd had threatened to "carry out what the state and law failed to." Police eventually moved in and cordoned off the house to keep the mob at bay, while several officers inside the house protected Peradze from being physically attacked.
The Interior Ministry issued a statement warning the protesters "to stay within the norms of law," adding that otherwise "police will intervene, in accordance with the law."
The rally ended without incident.
The defaced icon has been cleaned and moved to a more prominent spot, and authorities have started a legal procedure over the vandalism.
The defaced icon in Tbilisi on January 9
The protest has exposed the divisions that run deep in Georgia over the former Soviet dictator's legacy in his homeland.
The icon, donated to the church by leaders of the Alliance of Patriots of Georgia, a right-wing populist party, had been in the church for several months. It features a painting of St. Matrona of Moscow on its main panel, which is surrounded by scenes of her life on smaller panels, including one showing Stalin, an avowed atheist, standing next to the mystic and saint of the Russian Orthodox Church who died in 1952.
SEE ALSO: Furor In Georgia Over Depiction Of Stalin In Tbilisi CathedralPhotos of the icon when it was first unveiled several months ago sparked outrage among many Georgians, who condemned the appearance of the image in one of Georgia's main churches of a Soviet dictator who brutally oppressed religious clerics and religion in general while in power.
Despite massive campaigns of political killings and the destruction of churches during his rule from 1924 until his death in 1953, Stalin, who was an ethnic Georgian, is still viewed with pride by many Georgians. Several public monuments to the communist dictator remain standing across the former Soviet republic.