Georgia tightens screws on opposition, jails more leaders
TBILISI: Georgia jailed two prominent opposition figures on Friday, the latest in a string of sentences that critics condemn as a crackdown on dissent that puts nearly all opposition leaders behind bars.
Georgia has faced political unrest since the ruling Georgian Dream party claimed victory in October's parliamentary elections.
The opposition rejected the results, triggering mass protests that escalated after the government suspended negotiations on joining the European Union.
Protesters accuse the ruling party of drifting toward authoritarianism and aligning the country with Moscow — allegations the government denies.
Opposition figures and rights activists are being targeted in a wave of arrests and prosecutions.
On Friday, a Tbilisi court ordered Nika Melia — the co-leader of the key opposition Akhali party — to be jailed for eight months.
Another prominent opposition politician, Givi Targamadze, was sentenced to seven months in prison.
The two were also barred from holding public office for two years.
They were convicted of failing to cooperate with a divisive parliamentary enquiry probing alleged abuses under jailed ex-president Mikheil Saakashvili.
Saakashvili, a pro-Western reformer, is serving a 12.5-year sentence on charges widely condemned by rights groups as politically motivated.
Melia has been in pre-trial detention since late May.
Targamadze, a member of Saakashvili's United National Movement (UNM), said he believed his sentence was 'a Russian order.'
In 2016, he survived a bomb attack when his car exploded in central Tbilisi just days before parliamentary elections.
Nearly all of Georgia's opposition leaders have been jailed this month on charges similar to those levelled at Melia and Targamadze.
They have dismissed the parliamentary commission as illegitimate and accused Georgian Dream of using it to silence dissent.
Ahead of last year's elections, Georgian Dream announced plans to outlaw all major opposition parties.
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