Mikheil Saakashvili, former president of Georgia and former head of Odesa Oblast Administration, has asked President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to grant him the status of a "civilian prisoner" in the context of the Russo-Ukrainian war.

Source: Saakashvili on Facebook, as reported by European Pravda

Details: Saakashvili says his appeal to Zelenskyy was prompted by his recent transfer from hospital back to prison, where he claims he was poisoned in March 2022 "shortly after the full-scale war began".

Georgia's former president believes Russia organised the poisoning and that the current Georgian government has "openly taken Russia's side". He argues that "it is absolutely clear that my persecution and my fate are linked to the war".

"I want to ask you, just as in 2019 when you restored my illegally revoked citizenship: please include me, as the former head of Odesa Oblast Administration and as the head of the Executive Committee of the National Reform Council, who is being illegally held by Georgia's pro-Russian regime, in the list of civilian prisoners of this war with the corresponding legal consequences," Saakashvili wrote.

Background:

• Saakashvili has been convicted in Georgia in several cases, including for embezzlement of state funds and illegal border crossing and sentenced to more than 12 years in prison.
• In November, Georgian prosecutors opened a criminal case against Saakashvili and seven other opposition leaders for allegedly calling for the overthrow of the government.
• At the same time, the Georgian authorities are seeking to declare Saakashvili's party, the United National Movement, unconstitutional.

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