 Several hours after the protest President Saakashvili invited three television journalists to hold a live press conference.He downplayed the opposition's calls for Merabishvili's resignation as 'very funny' and said that he would strongly support the Minister claiming he was "really a very good Minister".Several hundred protesters gathered outside the President's Office on March 17 to demand Merabishvili's resignation and an unbiased investigation of a high-profile murder scandal.