Former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, now leader of the opposition, was returned to his prison on Thursday (December 30th) from the military hospital where he was being treated after a hunger strike, the Georgia prison service said.
Read alsoGeorgia: ex-president Saakashvili transferred to a military hospital
Arrested on October 1 on his return from eight years of exile in Ukraine, Mr. Saakachvili refused to eat for 50 days in protest against his imprisonment for a conviction for abuse of power, the political nature of which he denounces. This 54-year-old pro-Westerner, at the head of his country from 2004 to 2013, began to eat again after being transferred at the end of November to a military hospital in Gori (east).
A weakened state of health
“Inmate Mikheil Saakashvili is in prison number 12“Said the Georgian Prison Service on Thursday, announcing his return to the Roustavi prison, about thirty kilometers from the capital Tbilisi. A deputy of the ruling Georgian Dream party, David Sergeyenko, assured the press that, according to the military hospital, Mikheil Saakashvili’s state of health had “stabilized“.
Nika Gvaramia, Mikheïl Saakashvili’s lawyer, said, however, that his client had the same weight when leaving the hospital as when he was hospitalized after the hunger strike. “He is weak, he is stunned», Declared Nika Gvaramia to the press, specifying that an announcement was to be Friday on the state of health of his client.
Read alsoGeorgia: Saakashvili lays down conditions to end his hunger strike
An independent council of doctors said in December that the former president still suffered from serious neurological disorders, according to them a consequence of ill-treatment suffered in detention. The arrest of this opposition figure exacerbated the political crisis resulting from last year’s legislative elections in Georgia, marked by fraud according to the opposition, and it also sparked the largest anti-government protests in 10 years. Human rights defenders accuse the Georgian government of using criminal charges to punish political opponents.