Mikheil Saakashvili, the ex-Georgian President and former Odesa Oblast governor, is getting closer to Ukraine. But it’s not clear if he will attempt to enter the nation where he is no longer welcome by President Petro Poroshenko.
Saakashvili arrived in Poland from the United States on Aug. 3, Polish TV channel Telewizja Republika reports. He took part in the commemoration events honoring the 73rd anniversary of Warsaw Uprising, a major World War II operation by the Polish resistance Home Army to liberate Warsaw from Nazi occupation.
Mikheil Saakashvili takes part in the commemoration events honoring the 73rd anniversary of Warsaw Uprising on Aug. 3.
While Saakashvili was in the United States visiting relatives, Poroshenko canceled Saakasvhili’s Ukrainian citizenship — which the Ukrainian leader gave him only two years ago.
Poroshenko’s move is seen as an attempt to politically sideline a rival ahead of the 2019 presidential and parliamentary elections, although the president’s spokesperson said that Saakashvili had given incorrect information in his 2015 application for citizenship.
The Commission on Citizenship suspended Saakashvili’s citizenship. The makeup of the group was changed on July 24, only three days before Poroshenko took his action against the ex-Georgian president.
Poroshenko appointed three new members in the 15-member commission, including Oleksiy Takhtai, the Interior Ministry’s state secretary and a close ally of Interior Minister Arsen Avakov, a political enemy of Saakashvili.
A person who resembles Takhtai features in video footage of negotiations on a corrupt deal at the Interior Ministry leaked in 2015. He denies the accusations.
Saakashvili’s supporters fear that he might face extradition once he’s back in Ukraine. Since the ex-president is not a Ukrainian citizen anymore, authorities can deny him entry. Saakashvili will also be banned from holding government office in Ukraine and taking part in elections.
In Georgia, he was charged with embezzlement of public funds and abuse of power. Georgian Justice Minister Thea Tsulukiani said on July 31 that Georgia will demand Saakashvili’s extradition from any country where he stays.
In Ukraine, however, no criminal cases have been opened against Saakashvili, according to a letter published on Aug. 4 from Prosecutor General’s Office to Saakashvili’s party lawyer.
In an opinion piece Saakashvili published in the Washington Post on Aug. 3, he said that “whatever Poroshenko’s intentions, he cannot stop my political activities, and even less can he silence me.”
He promised to keep mobilizing his supporters in Ukraine “to fight the rule of a corrupt and oligarchic elite.”
How Citizenship Commission suspended Saakashvili’s citizenship
The Kyiv Post has also found out the details of a meeting of the Commission on Citizenship that was held on July 26 and suspended Saakashvili’s citizenship. The way in which the commission acted on Saakashvili’s case suggests there was a rush.
Three out of the 15 members didn’t attend the meeting. Two of them, Head of the Demography and Social Research Institute at the National Academy of Sciences Ella Libanova and Culture Minister Yevhen Nyshchuk told the Kyiv Post they were on vacation.
But the third member who was absent, Poroshenko Bloc lawmaker Valery Patskan, told the Kyiv Post that he couldn’t make it because he was notified about the meeting on the morning of the same day, just three or four hours before it was taking place.
“I was in Zakarpattia Oblast and could not physically get to Kyiv within three or four hours,” the lawmaker said.
A source at the commission who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals said that only one of the 12 members who were present abstained, and the rest voted unanimously for the suspension of Saakashvili’s citizenship. Those who backed depriving Saakashvili of his citizenship include Deputy Justice Minister Natalia Sevastianova.
The rest of the commission members declined to comment, did not respond or were not available for comment.
The deputy head of the commission is Presidential Administration Head Ihor Rainin’s Chief of Staff Oleksiy Dniprov.
Dniprov, who was a deputy education minister under ex-President Viktor Yanukovych, was supposed to be fired under the 2014 lustration law on the dismissal of top officials who served the disgraced ex-president. However, Poroshenko kept Dniprov regardless of the law.
Dniprov is also under investigation in an embezzlement case against ex-Education Minister Dmytro Tabachnyk.
The commission also includes Presidential Administration Head Ihor Rainin; Yury Boshytsky, rector of the Kyiv Law Universtity; Viktor Voivalovich, a scholar at the Kuras Institute for Political, Ethnic and National Research; Viktor Kononenko, a deputy chief of the Security Service of Ukraine; Maksim Moiseyev, a Presidential Administration official; Deputy Defense Minister Ivan Rusnak and others.
