At the same time, she worked as an expert consultant in international law for the Parliament of Georgia and the Ministry for Environment Protection and Natural Resources.

Although she gave Shevardnadze strong support in his dealings with foreign countries (particularly with Russia), she spoke out forcefully against the corruption and inefficiency of his government's domestic policy, declaring it "absolutely incompetent."

She left the UCG in 2002, forming an opposition party called the Burjanadze-Democrats to fight the November 2003 parliamentary elections.

One of Burjanadze's first actions was to appeal for national unity and repeal the state of emergency declared by Shevardnadze, in an effort to restore stability to a country with a long history of political violence.

She was an obvious candidate for the post, as she is widely respected by her compatriots - opinion polling in 2003 showed her to be one of Georgia's three most popular political figures.

[3] Burjanadze's term as a parliamentary chairperson expired with the new legislature's inaugural session on 7 June 2008, when she was succeeded by David Bakradze.

[8] On 23 March 23, 2009, the Georgian interior ministry confirmed, that 10 of the activists from Burjanadze's party, Democratic Movement–United Georgia had been arrested.

Burjanadze said the arrests marked the start of a "punitive campaign" by the government against the opposition, ahead of the mass protest planned for 9 April to demand Saakashvili's resignation.