Court orders pre-trial detention for Giorgi Baramidze

The Tbilisi City Court has ordered the pretrial detention of United National Movement member Giorgi Baramidze as a measure of restraint.

Baramidze attended the court hearing.

The Prosecutor’s Office of Georgia arrested Gia Baramidze, a senior leader of the opposition United National Movement (UNM) and former Minister of Internal Affairs and Defence (2003–2004), pursuant to a court warrant on charges of state treason, specifically manifested through sabotage. The charge carries a prison sentence of up to four years.

According to the Prosecutor’s Office, Iago Khvichia’s author program ‘The Birth of Georgia’ in July this year, Giorgi Baramidze claimed that during the initial stage of the 1992–1993 armed conflict in Abkhazia, representatives of the Georgian armed forces did not take prisoners and executed them on the spot.

The Prosecutor’s Office said that by making the statement, Baramidze accused Georgia’s armed forces of violating international humanitarian law and committing serious war crimes.