The ministry called on the Georgian authorities to immediately stop the abuse of Saakashvili and hand him over to Ukraine.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine strongly protested against the inhumane treatment of Ukrainian citizen Mikheil Saakashvili, who is being held behind bars in Georgia. The statement of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was published on the official website of the department.
“In the worst traditions of the NKVD of the USSR, the Georgian authorities are using psychological and physical violence against Mikheil Saakashvili, denying him urgently needed medical assistance, deliberately creating an immediate threat to his life. The gross violation of human rights against a Ukrainian citizen is contrary to the declared course of Tbilisi to obtain EU membership. about the collapse of democracy in Georgia,” the document emphasizes.
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs calls on the Georgian authorities to immediately stop abusing Saakashvili and hand him over to Ukraine.
The department also appeals to foreign governments and international organizations to publicly defend the Ukrainian citizen, the former president of Georgia, whose life was in danger due to political repression by the Georgian authorities.
Detention and torture of Saakashvili in Georgia
On October 1, 2021, Saakashvili was detained in Georgia when he returned to his homeland for the first time in eight years on the eve of municipal elections.
In Georgia, he is accused of several criminal cases, including the organization of an attack on former Georgian deputy Valery Gelashvili in 2005. For this, he was sentenced in absentia to six years in prison.
Immediately after his detention, Saakashvili announced a hunger strike, which he agreed to end on November 19, 2021.
On November 29, Saakashvili was brought to court for the first time after his detention, where he stated that he was tortured while in custody. He considers the charges brought against him to be political persecution, and to be a political prisoner.
After a long hunger strike, the politician was in a serious condition, so he was transferred from the Rustavsk prison to the military hospital in Gori.
In December 2022, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine stated that they were deeply concerned about the significant deterioration of Saakashvili’s health, who at that time was in the “Vivamedi” medical center in Tbilisi.
On February 1, 2023, the President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyi, announced that the Georgian authorities were “publicly torturing and killing” Saakashvili.
