Categories
Journalistic Survey
Articles
Reportage
Analitic
Photo Reportage
Exclusive
Interview
Foreign Media about Georgia
Editorial
Position
Reader's opinion
Blog
Themes
Children's Rights
Women's Rights
Justice
Refugees/IDPs
Minorities
Media
Army
Health
Corruption
Elections
Education
Penitentiary
Religion
Others

Youngest Convicted Left Prison With the Status of a Political Prisoner

January 14, 2013
Shorena Kakabadze, Kutaisi

On December 21, Parliament of Georgia passed Amnesty Law and about 3 000 prisoners were to leave the penitentiary establishments throughout the country; among them are political prisoners. First wave of prisoners left custodies on January 13 and about 190 prisoners left prisons throughout Georgia. Giorgi Zerekidze was the youngest of them.

Zerekidze’s name was mentioned at the very first session of the Human Rights Committee at the parliament, when human rights defenders held first meeting about political prisoners. On November 1, when family members of the alleged political prisoners also attended the Committee session, Giorgi Zerekidze’s mother was also there; representatives of human rights organizations presented list of alleged political prisoners then.

Human Rights Center also presented its position at the committee session and declared that release of political prisoners through pardoning and plea-agreements should end in Georgia. Those people should be immediately, unconditionally and honorably released from penitentiary establishments. Also, some cases were to be discussed by the court repeatedly and to timely restitute the breached rights of arbitrary prisoners.

This organization, alongside other human rights organizations, introduced list of political prisoners to the Human Rights Committee and requested the legislative body to work out a special normative act to resolve this problem; thus, the people on the list should have officially received status of political prisoners.

21-year-old Giorgi Zerekidze was also on the list of 174 alleged political prisoners. In her interview to humanrights.ge, Giorgi Zerekidze’s mother Lika Zerekidze said her son was Mikheil Saakashvili’s personal prisoner and he was put in prison for no crime. She hoped, the new government will find out the truth and her son will be discharged of punishment.

Zerekidze left prison with the status of a political prisoner on January 13, after seven-year imprisonment for hooliganism.

Today, Giorgi Zerekidze’s mother Lika Zerekidze recalled the story of her son’s detention with humanrights.ge; this fact was followed by the arrest of her husband who later died in the prison; and now, on January 13 the justice was redressed.

“Giorgi was arrested in January of 2006. Innocent child, who was just 14, was sentenced to 10-year imprisonment. Of course, Giorgi was innocent and it was proved by clear controversy between shameful accusation and reality. We appealed the initial verdict at the Appeal Court and his punishment was reduced at three years. However, it was not enough. Completely innocent child remained in the prison,” said Lika Zerekidze.

Parents of the juvenile prisoner appealed to Strasbourg Court. Zerekidze’s case was already pending before the Strasbourg Court when government of Georgia, namely the Ministry of Corrections and Legal Assistance with Khatuna Kalmakhelidze as a minister, demanded the Zerekidzes to stop litigation. Instead, they promised the family to release the juvenile prisoner immediately.

Lika Zerekidze: “They detained us – my husband and I - as soon as we arrived from Strasbourg. They planted drugs on my husband and he was arrested for the possession of large amount of narcotic substance. It was horrible. My husband asked me to admit the fact to avoid next tragedy. The government could dare anything. It happened on March 19, 2010. My husband was Saakashvili’s personal prisoner for his activities, for his different opinion that was not acceptable for that time regime.”

On July 1, 2010 former minister of education and science Dimitry Shashkin made a statement on one of the national TV-Channels about those nine prisoners, who were about to take United National Exams. Shashkin promised the society to release them from prison, if they had passed exams. The minister kept his promise though not completely. Three juvenile prisoners really left prison but Giorgi Zerekidze remained.

“They justified themselves by stating that Giorgi was already 18. It was groundless evidence against him. They did not want Giorgi to be free. Saakashvili directly stated in his TV-statements that Zerekidze was a criminal and that he would be punished. My husband could not stand this injustice; he was making speeches at the demonstrations, assemblies and made loud statements against Saakashvili’s bloody regime. This resulted into the tragedy of my family. My husband was found dead in prison cell in absolutely obscure circumstances on August 16, 2011. Allegedly he killed himself. We requested evidence, any proof of his suicide but we could not obtain anything so far. We have reasonable doubt that he was killed,” said Lika Zerekidze.

Giorgi Zerekidze’s mother believes the justice was restored and her son left prison with the status of a political prisoner after a long imprisonment. As for her husband’s case, Lika Zerekidze said this case will be handed to law enforcement bodies for a new investigation and the truth will be finally estimated.

News