Not me, parliament speaker has to apologize for bringing me to this condition – ex-pres. Saakashvili

Georgia’s currently imprisoned former president Mikheil Saakashvili on Monday addressed a trial hearing involving him via a video link and claimed Parliament speaker Shalva Papuashvili should have apologized for his “utterly complicated health”, rather than him, whom the speaker had accused of “harmful campaign against the state” using his health. 

 

Papuashvili’s comment came following the May ruling by the European Court of Human Rights, which rejected Saakashvili’s transfer abroad on health grounds. The court also rejected the former president’s transfer to any clinic inside the country from the Vivamedi civilian clinic, where he has  been receiving treatment since May 2022. 

 

Georgian officials said the ECHR had “confirmed” and “put an end” to Saakashvili’s “fake, anti-state campaign” on his health, and urged the former official to apologize for “damaging the country’s image abroad” through “unfounded claims” on torture and ill-treatement while in custody.

 

Revealing his body online during the trial, Saakashvili said Papuashvili, not him should apologize for “bringing me to this condition”, challenging the government’s claims that the former official has been engaged in “self-harm” to ensure his “illegal release” from prison since his arrest in Tbilisi in October 2021. 

 

Saakashvili initially addressed the session in Ukrainian, as he currently holds the country’s citizenship and held a public post before his arrest after eight years abroad. 

 

“It turns out that the European Parliament should apologize for demanding my release. I want to tell the speaker of the parliament that you should apologize for bringing me to this condition, you should apologize to the MEPs, my family, to me, to the state of Ukraine and to all Georgians, that the founder of the modern Georgian state is in this condition”, Saakashvili said. 

 

The November 7 case refers to opposition rally dispersal in 2007 with the use of force by the former United National Movement government under Saakashvili. 

 

The former president is currently serving his six-year-term for abuse of power while in office in two separate cases. Three other cases involving him are pending.