Troops deployed in Georgian capital

Soldiers cordoned off central Tbilisi on Thursday after President Mikhail Saakashvili of Georgia declared a 15-day state of emergency and shut down independent media to quash six days of anti-government protests.

Opposition leaders said they were suspending protests to avoid more injuries. More than 550 demonstrators were treated in hospitals on Wednesday after the government sent in riot police officers, who beat them with batons, fired rubber bullets and sprayed tear gas.

"We don't know where half the opposition leaders are, they were dispersed," said Salome Zourabichvili, a protest leader and a former foreign minister.

Saakashvili justified the police action by saying that neighboring Russia was stirring trouble and that he had expelled three Russian diplomats.

Schools and colleges were closed until next week and protests were restricted.

Human rights groups and the Georgian Orthodox Church said the president's actions were inexcusable.

"Georgians have a right to protest peacefully without being beaten by the police," said Human Rights Watch, which is based in the United States. "Firing rubber bullets at peaceful demonstrators is a complete abuse of the use of force."

Saakashvili is facing his worst crisis since he came to power in a bloodless revolution in 2003. A close U.S. ally, he has attempted to portray his former Soviet state as a beacon of democracy and stability in the volatile Caucasus region.

But opponents have charged that he has an authoritarian style that brooks no dissent, that human rights abuses have continued and that poverty and unemployment have not been reduced.

In signs of increasing international concern, the U.S. State Department called on the Georgian government and the opposition to avoid actions that could lead to further violence, and the European Union sent its top envoy for the region to Georgia.

Army trucks and hundreds of soldiers blocked side roads leading into Tbilisi's main street on Thursday, allowing only a handful of people through onto the normally thronged road.

Armed police officers stormed the main opposition broadcaster on Wednesday and took it off the air, forcing staff members to the ground and holding guns to their heads. All independent television news programs have been halted for the 15-day state of emergency.

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty said the authorities had also blocked its Georgian-language programs.

Prime Minister Zurab Nogaideli said the authorities had prevented a coup and Saakashvili said he had evidence that Russian intelligence had been organizing the opposition.

Protest leaders dismissed the charges as absurd, saying that they mostly shared Saakashvili's pro-Western foreign policy stance.