Previous Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili was given a second prison sentence on Monday, extending his entire sentence to 1212 years, in a verdict he criticized as illegal.
Saakashvili, who presided over Georgia from 2004 to 2013, had earlier been found guilty of larceny and abuse of power, which he and his defense argued were politically motivated.
He was convicted of unlawful border cross and given a four-year and six-month sentence on Monday. He now has to offer 12 years and six months in jail because his previous words have grown.
Saakashvili criticized the verdict on Monday as “absolutely illegal, unfair sentencing of me for crimes I have never committed” in a videoconference interview.
He claimed,” They want to kill me in incarceration.” “I’ll combat until the conclusion, but no matter what.”
As chairman of the South Caucasus region of 3.7 million, Saakashvili, who led the so-called Rose Revolution protests that pushed his father out of business in 2003, enacted a number of ambitious measures to combat national problem. He furthermore presided over a brief but contentious conflict with Russia in 2008 that ended with the degrading demise of its final strongholds in two secessionist countries, and he retaliated against demonstrators who claimed his zeal had morphed into monarchy.
Bidzina Ivanishvili, a gloomy businessman who made his fortune in Russia, won the election in 2012 against Saakashvili’s United National Movement group. The opposition accuses Georgian Dream of dragging the nation away from the path of European Union membership and returning to Russia’s sphere of influence, but the group has remained in power ever since, tightening its hold on political rights.
Saakashvili immigrated to Ukraine in 2013 and spent the 2015-16 years as the government of the southern Odesa area. He was quickly detained when he returned to Georgia in October 2021 to try to boost opposition causes ahead of national municipal elections.
After going on a hunger strike and after claiming that he had been poisoned, the former president spent a significant portion of his time in a prison doctor. His health is apparently getting worse frequently, according to the doctor, and he is already receiving medical care at the Vivamedi Clinic where he is being treated for a number of serious problems.
Beka Basilaia, Saakashvili’s attorney, claimed Monday’s conviction once more demonstrated Saakashvili’s political prisoner status.
The court is a comedy and will make any decision it is instructed to, Basilaia said,” as long as Georgian Dream continues to be in strength.”
