Two Citizens of Georgia Remain in Tskhinvali Detention Setting

Lado Bitchashvili, Shida Kartli

On January 20, the 62nd round of the meetings in the frame of the Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism was organized in Ergneti village. Detention of people for alleged illegal crossing of the so-called border was one of the topics on the meeting agenda. Head of the analytic department of the State Security Service of Georgia Irakli Beraia said all of 11 detainees were freed for the past one month but two more citizens of Georgia still remain in the Tskhinvali based prison. Tskhinvali court sentenced them to one-year imprisonment for illegal crossing of the so-called border.

“11 facts of illegal crossing of the so-called border occurred since the last meeting. Three of them occurred in January 2016. Nowadays, only two citizens of Georgia are arbitrarily imprisoned in Tskhinvali – one of them was arrested in November 2015 and second in April of 2015. Another topic of our discussion was illegal erecting of banners, fences and wire-fences alongside the so-called border that blatantly violate the rights of our citizens and restrict their right to movement,” the head of the Analytical Department told journalists after the meeting.

According to Beraia, during the meeting the Ossetian side did not ask the Georgian side for assistance in the search of a Russian soldier who disappeared a week ago. According to the news agency OsInfo, law enforcement officers are looking for Viktor Ivanov, 19. His photos are hanging in the streets of Tskhinvali and the local de-facto authority promised award of 150 000 Russian Ruble to a person who will find him.

Representatives of the Government of Georgia have questions about the death of Davit Basharuli, who disappeared in the occupied Akhalgori one and half year ago. Several months later, representatives of the Tskhinvali de-facto government said that 19-year-old Davit Basharuli was found dead.

“As for the expertise of Davit Basharuli’s body, I would like to say that we have many questions about his death. The results of the expertise, which was conducted in Vladikavkaz, do not coincide with the results of the Tbilisi conducted expertise. It is natural that until we do not get comprehensive answers to all our questions, we keep on asking them,” Beraia said.

The participants spoke about agricultural issues too; namely they spoke about cleaning works of the Tiriponi channel, which is located on the occupied territory.