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Tymoshenko slams ex-Georgian leader’s detention as ‘political terror’

According to Tymoshenko, the law enforcement agents "broke into Saakashvili’s house, without allowing him to talk to his lawyers, and forced him to go to the roof in the eyes of the world"

© REUTERS/Valentyn Ogirenko

KIEV, December 5. /TASS/. The All-Ukrainian Union Fatherland (Batkivshchyna) faction in the Ukrainian parliament views former Georgian leader Mikhail Saakashvili’s detention as a political terror, the faction’s leader Yulia Tymoshenko said on Tuesday.

"No one has the right to carry out mass repressions in full view of a watching world and stage a massacre against former Georgian president Mikhail Saakashvili. This is a political terror, which has become Ukraine’s face," Tymoshenko told the parliament, the Verkhovna Rada.

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Saakashvili detained in Kiev — MP

According to Tymoshenko, on Tuesday morning the law enforcement agents "broke into Saakashvili’s house, without allowing him to talk to his lawyers, and forced him to go to the roof in the eyes of the world."

"We can have different attitude to Saakashvili, but we cannot turn a blind eye to the political terror," Tymoshenko stressed.

Later on Tuesday, the law enforcement agents should explain the situation and "stop this shameful act," she said.

After Saakashvili resigned as governor of the Odessa Region, he left Ukraine and was stripped of the Ukrainian citizenship, which he had been personally granted by the president. In early September, Saakashvili returned to the country with support of his associates. The court found him guilty of illegally crossing the border and ordered him to pay a fine. Saakashvili asked the migration service to give him a status of a citizen who needs additional protection, but his request was denied.

Later, Ukraine’s top prosecutor hinted that Saakashvili could be extradited to Georgia, where several criminal cases had been opened against him. Now Saakashvili is trying to appeal the migration service’s decision. The lawsuit is expected to be considered on December 12. He also lodged a lawsuit on recognizing as illegal the decree on stripping him of Ukrainian citizenship, which will be considered by Ukraine’s Supreme Administrative Court on December 21.

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Ukraine crisis Mikhail Saakashvili

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