The politician was convicted of illegally crossing the border in 2021.
The former president of Georgia will be released from prison on April 1, 2034 at the earliest. He will then be 66 years old.
,,Taking into account previous sentences, Saakashvili will spend a total of 12.5 years in prison, announced Judge Mikheil Dzhindzholiya of the Tbilisi City Court.
Four other men were charged along with Saakashvili, but their case was separated into separate proceedings and they themselves were released on bail.
On March 12, Mikheil Saakashvili was sentenced to 9 years in prison in the so-called "jacket case" for embezzling $5.4 million for his son's education, leisure and luxury goods. He was previously convicted of pardoning Interior Ministry officials involved in the murder of banker Sandro Girgvliani and of assaulting opposition politician Valery Gelashvili. The politician has been in prison since the fall of 2021. He was arrested after secretly returning to Georgia by ship from Ukraine, hidden in a container of dairy products. At that time he had the status of a fugitive and was sentenced in absentia.
The former Georgian president served most of his sentence in a prison hospital. He has staged several hunger strikes from behind bars. He claims that the subsequent trials against him are politically motivated and revenge by his opponents.
For the pro-Russian Georgian Dream party of billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili, which has ruled Georgia since 2014, Mikheil Saakashvili is enemy number one. Accusations of ties to the former president are a common pretext for the ruling camp to discredit and repress opposition politicians. The Georgian parliament has set up a commission of inquiry into alleged abuses by the United National Movement party founded by Saakashvili.
md / belsat.eu / Ekho Kavkaza
