TBILISI, September 4, 2008 (AFP) - Georgian police have arrested the son of the country's first post-Soviet president Zviad Gamsakhurdia on charges of treason, the interior ministry said Thursday.

Tsotne Gamsakhurdia, who has been the target of repeated accusations by the government and whose brother heads one of the many small parties that oppose President Mikheil Saakashvili, was arrested overnight at Tbilisi airport.

'Tsotne Gamsakhurdia was arrested last night at Tbilisi Airport and is now in detention,' interior ministry spokesman Shota Utiashvili told AFP on Thursday. 'He has been wanted, since 2007, on suspicion of treason.'

The authorities had already released video footage to Georgian television showing Tsotne Gamsakhurdia allegedly meeting with a Russian diplomat in Tbilisi after riot police forcefully dispersed an anti-government rally in November.

His brother is the opposition Freedom Party leader Konstantin Gamsakhurdia.

As part of a policy of national reconciliation, Saakashvili has sought to give former supporters of Gamsakhurdia posts in government and has also sought to rehabilitate the memory of the former president.

Gamsakhurdia was ousted from power in 1992 by the opposition and was later found dead in mysterious circumstances.

He was succeeded by the former Soviet Foreign Minister Eduard Shevardnadze who was in turn ousted by the 2003 Rose Revolution that brought Saakashvili to power.