TBILISI -- The Tbilisi City Court on September 20 resumed the trial of former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili on a charge of violently dispersing an anti-government rally in November 2007, which he and his supporters have reject as politically motivated.
An emaciated Saakashvili joined the trial via a videolink from a Tbilisi hospital, greeting "all in Georgia" and saying "I am still weak, but my spirit is high, because it belongs to the entire Georgian people."
Former members of Saakashvili's government, Vano Merabishvili, Zurab Adeishvili, David Kezerashvili, and Gigi Ugulava, are also defendants in the case.
Saakashvili, who was Georgia’s president from 2004 to 2013, is serving a six-year sentence for abuse of power, a charge that he and his supporters say was politically motivated.
He was separately charged with illegally crossing the border in October 2021, when he returned to Georgia from self-imposed exile.
Family members and his lawyers have warned for months that Saakashvili’s health condition has been deteriorating even as he has been receiving medical treatment in a private clinic in Tbilisi since May last year.
Saakashvili's medical team has said his health has worsened since he went to prison in October 2021 and staged repeated hunger strikes to protest against his incarceration.
Saakashvili's legal team has also asserted that he was "poisoned" with heavy metals while in custody.
Since the 55-year-old politician’s arrest in 2021, several mass rallies have been held by his supporters and opposition activists, demanding his immediate release.
Saakashvili is a Ukrainian citizen and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said in early July that Russia was killing Saakashvili, using the Georgian authorities as their proxy. He also instructed his country's Foreign Ministry to summon the Georgian ambassador and convey his protest.
The European Union has also expressed concerns over Saakashvili’s deteriorated health.