Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) will give its response next week on calls for release of opposition activists and supporters, opposition leaders said after meeting with Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili on August 12.
The opposition parties handed over to MIA list of activists, who, as they say, were arrested in recent months, amid street protest rallies, on fabricated charges, mainly related with drugs and illegal possession of arms.
At the meeting, which was a follow up to a meeting between President Saakashvili and some opposition leaders on August 6, the sides have also agreed to establish a type of a hotline to exchange information in case further incidents involving opposition activists.
“We have agreed that materials, which we have handed to the Interior Ministry, will be studied by them and in about after a week the Interior Ministry will give its concrete answer,” Irakli Alasania, leader of Our Georgia-Free Democrats, part of Alliance for Georgia, said after the meeting.
Zurab Abashidze of Our Georgia-Free Democrats, who also participated in the meeting, told Civil.Ge that the Alliance for Georgia (also involving Republican and New Rights parties) handed to MIA a list of 48 activists from various opposition parties, which were arrested by the police.
MP Levan Vepkhvadze, vice-speaker of the Parliament from the Christian-Democratic Movement, said before the meeting that he had a list of ten persons, which was compiled based on complaints submitted to his party by relatives of these arrested persons.
“We have also agreed that there will be a round-the-clock possibility of getting in touch with the Interior Ministry’s leadership if cases of politically-motivated arrests continue. I think both of these steps are positive development and expression of a good will,” he added.
Davit Usupashvili, leader of Republican Party, also part of Alliance for Georgia, said after the meeting that apart of concrete cases of politically-motivated arrests, participants also discussed “the system itself, which results into having of political prisoners.”
“I told Mr. Merabishvili, that this system itself should be dismantled and that we are ready to take part in the process of dismantling this system,” Usupashvili told journalists.
“We will be satisfied when those people, arrested for politically-motivated reasons, return back to their homes; if we are talking about the need to restore confidence, then the authorities can take a step in this direction by doing this [by releasing opposition activists],” MP Levan Vepkhvadze, vice-speaker of the Parliament from the Christian-Democratic Movement, said.
Sozar Subari, an outgoing public defender, who also participated in the meeting, said that dialogue in itself was positive development. “But it should now be followed by concrete results; so let’s wait what the result will be,” he said.
Pikria Chikhradze of the New Rights Party, part of Alliance for Georgia; MP Jondi Bagaturia of Georgian Troupe party; MP Paata Davitaia of On Our Own party; Sandro Bregadze of Freedom Party; Akaki Asatiani, leader of Traditionalists party; Zurab Tkemaladze of the Industrialist Party and Bachuki Kardava of National Democratic Party, which has one representative in the Parliament, also participated in the meeting with the Interior Minister.
“Is open for cooperation with all the political forces and we think that all the issues should be resolved through dialogue in a transparent way,” Shota Utiashvili, head of the Interior Ministry’s information and analytical department, told journalists.
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