State Security Service Head: US citizen denied entry to Georgia due to his involvement in “training of destructive groups”

Grigol Liluashvili, the Head of the Georgian State Security Service, on Thursday confirmed that a citizen of the United States had been denied entry into Georgia due to his alleged involvement in the “training of destructive groups” during the last month's protests against the bill on transparency of foreign influence, with the clashes of demonstrators with law enforcement outside the Parliament building in Tbilisi.

I confirm that there is some specific information based on highly reliable sources [of information]. The US Embassy has not contacted us as to why we did not permit the entry of this particular individual [in the country]. They most likely know the reason why [...], it was related to the protests of March 7-8, training of destructive groups, giving them instructions [by him], etc.”, Liluashvili noted.

“Even if Peter Ackerman [founding chair of the International Centre on Nonviolent Conflict] - if alive - had come [to Georgia], we wouldn't have let him in [the country] too [last year for his activities - training Georgian opposition’s representatives for the strategy of changing the government in the country without any elections]”, the head of the state body added.

In his response to the question whether the fact of the non-admission of the US citizen in the county had any connection to the United States Department of State’s recent sanctioning of four current and former Georgian judges, Liluashvili said he “could not confirm” if the sanctions were “directly related” to the fact.