Father, son accused of transporting ex. pres Saakashvili within Georgia denied bail
Prosecutor Giorgi Khachidze said Zurab and Shalva Tsotsoria knew that ex-president Mikheil Saakashvili was wanted by Georgian law enforcement officers for serious crimes. Nevertheless, they transported him to a village in Samegrelo on September 29. Photo: Interpressnews.ge.
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Tbilisi City Court has denied bail to Zurab and Shalva Tsotsoria, who are currently detained for transporting ex-president Mikheil Saakashvili to Georgia’s western region of Samegrelo after he illegally crossed into Georgia several days ago.
The defence demanded bail of 5,000 GEL for each individual.
Prosecutor Giorgi Khachidze said Zurab and Shalva Tsotsoria knew that Saakashvili was wanted by Georgian law enforcement officers for serious crimes. Nevertheless, they transported him to a village in Samegrelo on September 29.
Khachidze also noted there is a chance that Zurab and Shalva Tsotsoria may go on the run or influence witnesses if released on bail.
Police detained Shalva and Zurab Tsotsoria on October 3.
On October 4, Tbilisi City Court has also denied bail to Elguja Tsomaia, the owner of flat where Mikheil Saakashvili was detained.
Prosecutor Levan Vepkhvadze said Tsomaia knew that Saakashvili was wanted by Georgian law enforcement officers for serious crimes. Nevertheless, he handed over his apartment to Saakashvili for temporary residence and hiding.
Mikheil Saakashvili, who is a citizen of Ukraine, was detained in Tbilisi on October 1.
- Prosecutor’s Office charges owner of flat where ex-president Saakashvili was hiding before detention
Saakashvili, who served as Georgia’s president in 2003-2013, is charged with several criminal offences including the violent dispersal of anti-government mass protests on November 7, 2007, raiding of TV channel Imedi by riot police, and the illegal seizure of the property.
In a letter from the Rustavi detention facility ex-president of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili said all criminal accusations against him are false. Saakashvili also said that when he ‘left everything in Kyiv’ and arrived in Georgia he was aware that ‘most probably’ he would be detained.
Georgia’s Chief Prosecutor’s Office has charged father and son who transported ex-president Mikheil Saakashvili to Georgia’s western region of Samegrelo after he illegally crossed into Georgia several days ago.
The Georgian Interior Ministry says the detention of ex-President Mikheil Saakashvili, who is charged with several criminal offences, was planned in advance. Based on the information released by the ministry earlier today, Georgian law enforcers, the State Security Service and the General Prosecutor’s Office carried out a joint operation to detain ex-president Saakashvili.
Overall six criminal charges are filed against recently arrested Georgian ex-president Mikheil Saakashvili who has been convicted to six years of imprisonment in two cases while four other criminal cases are still being heard in Tbilisi City Court.
Georgian ex-president Mikheil Saakashvili released a live video allegedly from Georgia’s coastal city of Batumi late yesterday and said that he is already in Georgia ahead of tomorrow’s municipal elections. In the video Saakashvili has urged the public to vote for the United National Movement (UNM) in the elections and if not the UNM, then some other, smaller, ‘real opposition parties’ and not for the Georgian Dream ruling party (GD) or ex-PM Giorgi Gakharia’s For Georgia party.
Georgian former President Mikheil Saakashvili allegedly entered Georgia’s Black Sea port city of Poti via Ukrainian private company UkrFerry’s boat Vilnius ‘hidden in a truck,’ the Georgian Public Broadcaster’s (GPB) weekly analytical program New Week reports. The GPB says Saakashvili set foot in Georgia on September 29 at nine p.m. via boat which departed from the trading port of Chernomorsk in the Odessa region.
Four individuals who helped former Georgian president Mikheil Saakashvili illegally enter the country have been denied bail earlier today by Tbilisi City Court. Saakashvili was arrested in Tbilisi on October 1 after returning from eight years in political exile.