Ukraine’s National Police on Oct. 21 illegally deported three Georgian citizens without court warrants to Georgia, Ukraine’s Human Rights Ombudsman Valeria Lutkovska said at a news briefing on Nov. 22, citing an official letter that she had received from the State Migration Service.
Forced deportation without a court warrant is explicitly banned by Ukrainian law.
National Police spokesman Yaroslav Trakalo did not respond to requests for comment, while Interior Ministry spokesman Artem Shevchenko declined to comment.
The Georgians are Georgy Rubashvili, one of ex-Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili’s former security guards; Saakashvili’s friend David Makishvili, who fought against Russian-separatist troops in the Donbas and trained Ukraine’s National Guard, and Saakashvili’s former driver Mikhail Abzianidze. They say they were kidnapped in Kyiv, beaten, and then illegally transported to Georgia without a court warrant by Ukrainian authorities on Oct. 21. The authorities deny accusations of wrongdoing.
Boris Zakharov, a top member of the Ukrainian Helsinki Human Rights Union, said at the Nov. 22 briefing that the illegal deportation can be qualified as a crime under the Criminal Code articles on kidnapping and illegal detention.
He previously said that the deportation of the Saakashvili associates violated Ukrainian law, Article 29 of Ukraine’s Constitution and Article 5 of the European Convention of Human Rights.
The State Migration Service said that their residence permits had been canceled, and the service had told them to leave Ukraine voluntarily because it claimed they were a “threat to public order,” as cited by Lutkovska.
However, the service failed to provide any documents whatsoever on the grounds of the cancellation of the Georgians’ residence permits, any documents informing the Georgians about such cancellation or any documents confirming any actions that constituted a threat to public order, Lutkovska said.
Pavlo Bogomazov, the Georgians’ lawyer, also told the Kyiv Post that the State Migration Service and other state agencies had failed to give him any documents on the grounds for the cancellation of the Georgians’ residence permits or their expulsion.
One eyewitness of Makishvili’s alleged kidnapping told the Kyiv Post that one of the people who detained Makishvili presented himself as an employee of the State Security Department and showed a State Security Department ID.
The State Security Department, headed by Valery Heletei, provides security services to Poroshenko and other state agencies. Heletei denied involvement in the deportations.
Another eyewitness told the Kyiv Post he had seen camouflaged men detaining Makishvili and pushing him into a blue Volkswagen Multivan with a European Union license plate.
The eyewitnesses spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.
Abzianidze’s passport was stamped by the State Migration Service, which implies that a representative of the service was present during his expulsion from the country. The Kyiv Post obtained photos of the stamp.
State Migration Service spokesman Serhiy Hunko told the Kyiv Post that Rubashvili, Makishvili and Abzianidze had been ordered by the State Migration Service to leave Ukraine voluntarily, and there was no court warrant for their forced deportation by the Ukrainian authorities – which is illegal.
Tzvi Arieli, an acquaintance of Makishvili, said on Oct. 24, citing his sources, that Makishvili, Rubashvili and Abzianidze had been kidnapped by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU), the National Guard and the Border Guard.
The SBU denied being involved in the incident, while Border Guard spokesman Oleh Slobodyan told the Kyiv Post that a Border Guard employee had been present when Rubashvili, Abzianidze and Makishvili left the country.
National Guard spokesman Vadym Holub told the Kyiv Post that “the National Guard is not involved in issues of deportation,” but refused to say whether National Guard members were present when the deportation of the three Georgians took place on Oct. 21 and whether a National Guard plane had been used.
Saakashvili has said that the kidnapping operation had been ordered by President Petro Poroshenko as a political vendetta against him.The Presidential Administration declined to comment.
Arieli also said the three Georgians had been transported by an An-74 plane on flight UR84170, which belongs to Ukraine’s National Guard, from Kyiv’s Zhulyany Airport to Tbilisi on Oct 21. Ukraine’s State Air Navigation Agency confirmed to the Kyiv Post that flight UR84170 left Zhulyany Airport for Tbilisi on Oct. 21.
Arieli also published photographic evidence of Rubashvili’s alleged kidnapping.
The State Migration Service and Prosecutor General Yuriy Lutsenko said on Oct. 24 that Saakashvili and 20 more Georgians could also be deported.
The Prosecutor General’s Office has so far refused to investigate the alleged kidnappings. A court on Nov. 22 ordered prosecutors to investigate the events.
On Nov. 17, four more Saakashvili associates were kidnapped and later deported to Georgia by the SBU, National Police, State Migration Service and State Border Guard in what they say was an illegal operation without due process or any court warrants. Two of them say they were beaten.
The SBU claimed that the Georgians’ activities endanger national security, without specifying what the alleged security threats were, and that the deportation was carried out according to the law. However, Ukrainian authorities refused to say if there is any documentary proof or court warrants for the Georgians’ deportation. Under Ukrainian law, forced deportation is only possible with a court warrant.
Moreover, the deportation of one of the Georgians was explicitly banned by a court.
