President on ECHR’s Ruling into Merabishvili’s Pretrial Detention

Findings of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in the case of ex-interior minister Vano Merabishvili’s pretrial detention are “damaging” for Georgia and those officials, whose actions led to violations found by ECHR, should be held responsible, President’s office said on June 16.
 
“We would like to note that responsibility for such a damaging ruling lies on specific individuals in the law enforcement and judicial system. The President believes that the issue of officials, political and legal responsibility of these individuals should be raised,” President’s spokesperson Eka Mishveladze told journalists on June 16, without elaborating further into details.

The Strasbourg-based court said in its ruling on June 14 that Merabishvili’s initial pretrial detention in May, 2013 was lawful, but the decision of the Tbilisi City Court four months later, in September 2013, to remand him in detention lacked reasonable grounds.

The ECHR also found violation of Article 18 of the European convention on human rights, saying that Merabishvili’s detention was “used not only for the purpose of bringing” him before the relevant legal authorities on “reasonable suspicion” of various offenses with which he had been charged, “but was also treated by the prosecuting authorities as an additional opportunity to obtain leverage” over investigations into unrelated cases, including the one against ex-President Mikheil Saakashvili.

Article 18 of the Convention deals with situations when even if the state justifies restricting someone’s rights, it will still be deemed a violation if it turns out that this restriction of rights, among them detention, was used for some ulterior purposes, including hidden political agenda or any reason other than the one formally stated. There have been only few cases in the practice of the ECHR to find the violation of this article.

This finding by the Strasbourg-based court in respect of violation of the Article 18 stems from the incident that occurred in December 2013, when Merabishvili was removed from his cell and taken for a late-night meeting with then chief prosecutor, Otar Partskhaladze, whom Merabishvili accused of intimidation for the purpose of obtaining information about the death of the former Prime Minister, Zurab Zhvania, and about alleged secret offshore bank accounts of ex-President Mikheil Saakashvili.

The ECHR found this allegation of Merabishvili about his removal from the cell credible. The Court also noted that there was “clearly observable reluctance” by the prison authority to provide access to video images taken by the prison surveillance cameras, which could have shed more light on the incident; and in general, the ECHR said, the authorities, “notably” then Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili, then prison system minister Sozar Subari, who is now the minister in charge of IDPs issues, were “unmistakably opposed to the calls for an objective and thorough investigation”.

Justice Minister Tea Tskulukiani said on June 14 that the Georgian authorities will now have to investigate the December 2013 incident.

Opposition UNM party leaders welcomed the ECHR’s ruling as confirmation of what they have long been insisting, that Merabishvili is a “political prisoner” and called on the authorities to release him.

Asked if the President, who on June 16 met one of the leaders of opposition UNM party Giga Bokeria, would grant pardon to Merabishvili, President’s spokesperson responded: “At this stage this issue is not being considered.”

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