Court leaves five in pretrial detention on June 20 Tbilisi protest case
Tweet 
Share
Tbilisi City Court has left Zurab Budagashvili, Tsotne Tsotniashvili, Besik Tamliani, Tsotne Soselia and Kakhaber Kupreishvili in pretrial detention for possible incitement to violence during the June 20 rally in Tbilisi.
19 protesters and 2 police officers have been charged regarding the June 20-21 rallies in central Tbilisi, opposition MP Nika Melia and former Defence Minister Irakli Okruashvili among them.
The Tbilisi protests, which were sparked by the presence of Russian MPs in the Georgian parliament earlier on June 20, turned into a violent clash between protesters and police in front of the parliament of Georgia.
Then Interior Minister Giorgi Gakharia said in his televised interviews that the rally became “violent” starting at 10 p.m. following “a systematic and organised” attack on the parliament building on June 20.
Gakharia also said that he gave an order that the rally was dispersed after a part of the demonstrators decided to storm the parliament building.
The dispersal left 305 detained and 240 injured.
Tbilisi City Court has left Moris Machalikashvili and two others-Ilia Memanishvili and Gogi Kurdovanidze in pretrial detention for possible incitement to violence during the June 20 rally in Tbilisi. 19 protestors and 2 police officers have been charged regarding the June 20-21 rallies in central Tbilisi so far.
One of the men detained for incitement to violence at June 20 rally in Tbilisi, Soso Bajelidze, has been released on 5,000 GEL ($1,677) bail earlier on September 16.
The human rights defender Sopho Verdzeuli said the Tbilisi protest of June 20 in front of the parliament of Georgia “became violent” after around 10 p.m. “Quite a lot of demonstrators were physically attacking police officers from 10 p.m. to 12 a.m., grabbing their equipment, pulling police officers out of the cordon”, Verdzeuli wrote on her Facebook page.
Ambassadors of the European Union, Lithuania, the United Kingdom and the Netherlands to Georgia are urging for a transparent investigation into the police response to the June 20 rallies in Tbilisi.