Former Georgian president returns to prison after over 3 years in clinic

Mikheil Saakashvili, who served two terms as president of Georgia from 2004 to 2013, has been transferred back to prison after some 3.5 years in a civilian clinic, the Georgian Special Penitentiary Service announced on Facebook on Wednesday.

The penitentiary service noted that Saakashvili would be returned to a prison in Rustavi, near the capital of Tbilisi, “where he will continue to serve his sentence”, having been transferred from prison to a clinic in Tbilisi in May 2022 for treatment and examinations, where he remained under heavy guard.

One of the leaders of Georgia’s 2003 Rose Revolution, which led to the overthrow of Georgia’s then-president Eduard Shevardnadze, Saakashvili has for years been a vocal critic of the ruling Georgian Dream party, which has been in power since 2012.

After spending seven years in self-imposed exile, Saakashvili was arrested when he returned from Ukraine to Georgia in October 2021. Since then, human rights organisations have accused the Georgian authorities of seriously endangering his health by denying him adequate medical care.

Saakashvili, who had already been serving a six-year prison sentence for illegally pardoning four police officers in 2008 and ordering the beating of opposition MP Valeri Gelashvili in 2005, was sentenced to nine years in prison for embezzlement in March. Later that month, he was sentenced to a further 4.5 years for an “illegal border crossing” when returning from exile in 2021.

Earlier this month, the Georgian Prosecutor General announced that Saakashvili and a number of other opposition figures were to face fresh criminal charges including sabotage and calling for the violent overthrow of the government.