Justice began the deliberations on Thursday to decide whether the former leader, imprisoned since his return in 2021, must be released or whether to postpone his sentence for health reasons. A medical report says that it was “poisoned”.
by Faustine Vincent
The images are strangely red but it is the face of Mikheïl Saakachvili, very emaciated, which appears on the videoconferencing screen. The former Georgian president and leader of the opposition, who had not been seen in public for seven months, has been sitting on his hospital bed, hair in battle, a pillow behind the head. The fate of the former leader, imprisoned since his return to Georgia in October 2021 after eight years of exile, is decided these days at the Tilissi court. After two successive hearing reports, the Court began, Thursday, December 22, the deliberations to decide whether it must be released or whether it is necessary to postpone its sentence for health reasons.
The lawyers of Mikheïl Saakachvili formulated this request after having read the medical report of an American toxicologist, dated November 28, saying that the former president was “poisoned” to Mercury and Arsenic. According to this five -page document, which is based on the medical samples taken by a team of five other high -level American doctors, the “increased risk of mortality is imminent” without adequate treatment “which seems to have been refused or which is unavailable “.
” A question of life or death “
Thursday, a few dozen supporters of the former leader had gathered before the Tilissi court, signs in hand, to call to “save the president” and to release him. “We ask that Mikheïl Saakachvili be authorized to go abroad to receive medical care, as advocated by doctors, said his lawyer, Dito Sadzaglichvili. It is a question of life or death.” >
The health of the former leader has deteriorated a lot since his imprisonment. He lost more than 40 kilos in a year, including 25 kilos the last three months. On November 28, the Nino Lomjaria rights defender, who went to visit her, confirmed the “strong deterioration” of her state of health, “visually apparent”, and specified that Mr. Saakachvili “remains in practically all the time” .
In a letter transmitted to the world on December 8, the former president, who considers himself as the “personal prisoner” of Vladimir Putin, of which he has long been the Bane, called Emmanuel Macron for help. “As I am dying, I don’t have much time!”
Six days later, the Georgia special prison service, invoking a “great public interest”, broadcast controversial images of the ex-president at the hospital, recorded between August and September. The power party, a Georgian dream, founded by the Bidzina billionaire oligarch Ivanichvili, a great rival of Mikheïl Saakachvili, thus intended to demonstrate that he simulates the disease. On this video, from the surveillance cameras, we see the former president nervously agitating on his sheets, throwing objects on the staff, falling from his bed, smoking in front of the television and moving to the walker. “The simulated actions of Mikheïl Saakachvili are clearly visible. Their goal is to hinder the application of justice, to mislead the company and international partners,” said the prison service in a press release.
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