Georgian former president Mikheil Saakashvili, who was detained in Tbilisi on October 1 ahead of municipal elections in the country says he is ‘deeply touched’ by the support of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Zelensky announced at a briefing on October 3 that he will work to bring Ukrainian citizen and the third president of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili back to Ukraine using "various means".
Saakashvili was appointed as a head of the Executive Committee of the Ukrainian National Reforms Council last year, under Zelensky’s presidency.
I am deeply touched by your statement which is a response of the first-rate political leader to my illegal detention and imprisonment in Georgia based on the falsified charges that no one recognises in the world, except Russia,” Saakashvili told Zelensky in a recently released letter on Facebook.
In the letter Saakashvili says that Georgia ‘is love of my life, while Ukraine is my second homeland.’
All my life I will be proud of having the opportunity to modestly contribute to the current historical changes and reforms in Ukraine with your leadership. Since, in fact, I am a personal prisoner of Putin, I highly appreciate your fundamental stance to protect Ukraine, the entire region, and all prisoners of the empire,” Saakashvili wrote.
Saakashvili left Georgia back in 2013 and has not returned to Georgia until now.
He says he returned to help his United National Movement (UNM) opposition party to win the municipal elections and change the current Georgian Dream government via snap parliamentary elections.
Saakashvili was convicted in Georgia in 2018 in absentia for abuse of authority and was sentenced to six years in prison.
He has also been charged with several other crimes.
Three individuals have been charged with concealing crime regarding the recent return of Saakashvili, while an additional charge, for illegally crossing the border, has been filed against the former president.