Tbilisi City Court holds substantive hearing in Giorgi Baramidze’s case

Giorgi Baramidze, a member of the United National Movement, says the case against him is a dirty smear campaign in the Russian style. Speaking at today’s court hearing, Baramidze said he was being tried on fabricated charges.

According to Baramidze, the case concerns whether he made a specific statement and whether that statement caused damage to the country.

“This is not merely politically motivated. Even this regime could hardly have been expected to come up with such filth. It is a dirty smear campaign in the Russian style, aimed not only at causing me discomfort but at achieving two objectives – pleasing Russia and tarnishing, discrediting my reputation. The issue is whether I said something and whether it caused harm to our homeland, ” he said.

“This is a fabricated charge and a pointless waste of everyone’s time. I accept criticism that I should not have used that word and should have chosen another one. If I unintentionally hurt anyone, I apologized. I explained my interview in every possible way. All it takes is to read it,” Giorgi Baramidze said.

The substantive hearing of the case against Baramidze is underway at Tbilisi City Court.

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.

On September 12, the court ordered pre-trial detention as a preventive measure against Giorgi Baramidze.