Ex-Pres Saakashvili says Georgia faces ‘most dangerous enemy in long time,” calls for intensified resistance

Georgia’s Former President Mikheil Saakashvili on Thursday said on social media that the country was confronting “a dangerous, oppressive, evil and cruel enemy” and called for an escalation of political struggle, after prosecutors filed new charges he described as politically motivated.

Saakashvili denounced what he called political persecution against him and other opposition figures and urged supporters and Western partners to step up resistance to the current Government.

He said he has been formally charged over comments made at what he termed his political trial and that investigators questioned him about a remark calling on people to take a “selfie with Ivanishvili’s shark”.

“I extend my sincere solidarity to all politicians charged and to the innocent people imprisoned,” Saakashvili wrote, calling on Western countries to impose “much tougher and broader” sanctions on what he described as the “bandit dictatorship” of Bidzina Ivanishvili.

“Now is not the time to lower our hands but to multiply our struggle. We must be able to defeat this enemy and reclaim the present and the future,” he said, adding that Georgians have the strength, talent and courage to remove what he termed a corrupt regime.

Saakashvili also appealed to those who have previously been silent about his status as a political prisoner to recognise “the injustice” and speak out.