Georgian prime minister Irakli Garibashvili on Monday responded to imprisoned former president Mikheil Saakashvili being awarded the Sjur Lindebrække Prize for Democracy and Human by the Norwegian Conservative party, comparing the former official with Anders Breivik, who killed eight people with a car bomb in Oslo in July 2011, before shooting dead 69 people at a summer youth camp.

“We [the Georgian Dream authorities] inherited the hellish system that was killing, raping and torturing people”, Garibashvili said in reference to Saaakshvili’s United National Movement in office between 2004 and 2012, and stressed it was an “insult” Saaakshvili, “an authoritarian ruler, the creator of that oppressive murderous system” receiving the award. 

“You remember that in Norway Breivik killed many people, it is the same as some country rewarding him with a human rights prize”, Garibashvili added. 

Saakashvili was arrested in Tbilisi in October 2021 and is now serving his six-year-sentence for abuse of power while in office. Three other cases involving him are still pending.