Eduard Dzhabeyevich Kokoity (31 October 1964-) was President of South Ossetia from 18 December 2001 to 10 December 2011, succeeding Lyudvig Chibirov and preceding Vadim Brovtsev.
Biography[]
Eduard Kokoity was born in Tskhinvali, Georgian SSR, Soviet Union in 1964, and he was a national wrestling champion before serving as First Secretary of the Tskhinvali Komsomol. He moved to Moscow in 1992 to become a businessman after learing about capitalism, and he moved back to South Ossetia in 2001. He was elected President that same year as a member of the Unity Party of South Ossetia, and he took a strong position against reunification with the Republic of Georgia, leading to the Russo-Georgian War in 2008. Kokity became controversial due to his use of Russian aid, and he controversially claimed that South Ossetia would join Russia, arguing that South Ossetia never left the Russian Empire. He left office in 2011.