Mikheil Saakashvili

Mikheil "Misha" Saakashvili (born 21 December 1967) is a Georgian and Ukrainian politician and jurist. He was the third president of Georgia for two consecutive terms from 25 January 2004 to 17 November 2013. He is the founder and former chairman of Georgia's United National Movement party. From May 2015 until November 2016, Saakashvili was the governor of Ukraine's Odesa Oblast. After resigning, he was temporarily exiled, but returned in 2019 under a new President. Saakashvili returned to Georgia in 2021, and has been imprisoned there since then.

Saakashvili entered Georgian politics in 1995 as a member of parliament and Minister of Justice under President Eduard Shevardnadze. He then founded the opposition United National Movement party. In 2003, as a leading opposition figure, he accused the government of rigging the 2003 Georgian parliamentary election, triggering mass street protests and President Shevardnadze's ouster in the bloodless Rose Revolution. Saakashvili's key role in the protests led to his election as President in 2004. He was reelected in 2008. However, his party lost the 2012 Georgian parliamentary election. Term limits meant he could not stand again, and an opposition candidate won the 2013 presidential election.

As president, Saakashvili oversaw far-reaching reforms. His government fired and replaced the entire police force, hoping to root out corruption, and pursued a zero-tolerance policy towards crime. Its neoliberal economic policy abolished various taxes, lowered corporate income tax from 20% to 15% and dividend tax from 10% to 5%. Several ministries were abolished and 60,000 civil servants dismissed, slashing government spending, although the military budget rose to 9.2% of GDP by 2007. In 2009, Forbes ranked Georgia's tax burden as the fourth lowest in the world. GDP grew 70% between 2003 and 2013. Per-capita income roughly tripled, but by 2013 about a quarter of the population was still below the poverty line, even as international perceptions emphasised business-friendliness and reduced corruption.

The Abkhazian and Ossetian conflicts escalated in 2008; Russia officially announced its support for separatists in Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Saakashvili led Georgia through the five-day 2008 Russo-Georgian War. Georgia lost control of the disputed territories, and Russia recognized their independence. Georgia responded by breaking off diplomatic relations.

Saakashvili's government responded violently to mass street demonstrations in 2007, triggered by the detention of politician Irakli Okruashvili; in 2009 led by Salome Zourabichvili, Nino Burjanadze, David Gamkrelidze and Eka Beselia; and in 2011, led again by Burjanadze. Saakashvili was embroiled in scandals and accused of being behind police brutality, such as the beating of opposition politician Valery Gelashvili, the murder of Sandro Girgvliani, and systemic torture and rape in the Georgian prison system.

In late 2013, ex-President Saakashvili left Georgia. In 2014, the Prosecutor's Office of Georgia filed criminal charges against him. In 2018, the Tbilisi City Court sentenced him ''in absentia'' to six years in prison for ordering the beating of Valery Gelashvili and pardoning by prior agreement the individuals tried for Sandro Girgvliani's murder. Saakashvili continued to manage his party from abroad while accusing the Georgian government of using the legal system for political retribution.

Saakashvili supported Ukraine's Euromaidan movement and the Revolution of Dignity. On 30 May 2015, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko appointed him Governor of Odesa Oblast. He accepted Ukrainian citizenship, thereby forfeiting his Georgian citizenship under Georgian law. On November 7th 2016, Saakashvili announced his resignation as governor while blaming Poroshenko personally for enabling corruption in Odesa and in Ukraine generally. Four days later, he launched a new Ukrainian political party called Movement of New Forces.

In July 2017, Saakashvili (then visiting the US) was stripped of his Ukrainian citizenship by President Poroshenko, and became stateless. He reentered Ukraine, but was arrested in February 2018 and deported. He was granted permanent residency in the Netherlands. In May 2019, he returned to Ukraine after newly-elected President Volodymyr Zelenskyy restored his citizenship. Zelenskyy appointed Saakashvili to lead Ukraine's National Reform Council in May 2020.

In October 2021, Saakashvili announced his return to Georgia after an eight-year absence. Later the same day Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili announced that he had been arrested in Tbilisi. Investigators alleged he had entered Georgia illegally, bypassing the customs control. He was imprisoned in a penitentiary in Rustavi.

In 2021, he began serving the six-year ''in absentia'' prison sentence imposed in 2018.Statement of the Prosecution Service of Georgio
Prosecutor's Office of Georgia (1 October 2021). President of Georgia Salome Zourabichvili stated that she would "never" pardon Saakashvili. He was often transferred to and from hospital for health reasons, and since May 2022 has been treated in a civilian clinic in Tbilisi.

Early life and education

Saakashvili was born in Tbilisi on 21 December 1967, capital of the then Georgian Soviet Socialist Republic in the Soviet Union. His father, Nikoloz Saakashvili, is a physician who practises medicine in Tbilisi and directs a local balneological centre. His mother, Giuli Alasania, is a historian who lectures at Tbilisi State University.

During university, he served his shortened military service in 1989–1990 with the Soviet Border Troops' checkpoint unit in the Boryspil Airport in Ukraine (then as Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, also a part of the Soviet Union). Saakashvili graduated from the Institute of International Relations (Department of International Law) of the Taras Shevchenko National University of Kyiv in 1992. At this university, he was friends with later President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko. While in Ukraine, Saakashvili participated in the October 1990 student protest known as the " Revolution on Granite".

Saakashvili briefly worked as a human rights officer for the interim State Council of Georgia following the overthrow of President Zviad Gamsakhurdia before receiving a fellowship from the United States State Department (via the Edmund S. Muskie Graduate Fellowship Program). He received an LL.M. from Columbia Law School in 1994 and took classes at the School of International and Public Affairs and The George Washington University Law School the following year. In 1993, he also received a diploma from the International Institute of Human Rights in Strasbourg, France.

Election to Georgian Parliament

Saakashvili interned at the United Nations. After graduation, while on internship in the New York law firm of Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler in early 1995, he was approached by Zurab Zhvania, an old friend from Georgia who was working on behalf of President Eduard Shevardnadze to enter politics. He stood in the December 1995 elections along with Zhvania, and both men won seats in parliament, standing for the Union of Citizens of Georgia, Shevardnadze's party.

Saakashvili was chairman of the parliamentary committee which was in charge of creating a new electoral system, an independent judiciary and a non-political police force. Opinion surveys recognised him to be the second most popular person in Georgia, behind Shevardnadze. He was named "man of the year" by a panel of journalists and human rights advocates in 1997. In January 2000, Saakashvili was appointed vice-president of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

On 12 October 2000, Saakashvili became Minister of Justice for the government of President Shevardnadze. He initiated major reforms in the Georgian criminal justice and prisons system. This earned praise from international observers and human rights activists. But, in mid-2001, he became involved in a major controversy with the State Security Minister Vakhtang Kutateladze and Tbilisi police chief Ioseb Alavidze, accusing them of profiting from corrupt business deals.

Saakashvili resigned on 5 September 2001, saying that "I consider it immoral for me to remain as a member of Shevardnadze's government." He declared that corruption had penetrated to the very centre of the Georgian government and that Shevardnadze lacked the will to deal with it, warning that "current developments in Georgia will turn the country into a criminal enclave in one or two years."

In the United National Movement

Having resigned from the government and quit the Shevardnadze-run Union of Citizens of Georgia party, Saakashvili founded the United National Movement (UNM) in October 2001, a centre-right political party with a touch of nationalism, to provide a focus for part of the Georgian reformists leaders. In June 2002, he was elected as the Chairman of the Tbilisi Assembly ("Sakrebulo") following an agreement between the United National Movement and the Georgian Labour Party. This gave him a powerful new platform from which to criticize the government.

Georgia held parliamentary elections on 2 November 2003 which were denounced by local and international observers as being grossly rigged. Saakashvilli claimed that he had won the elections (a claim supported by independent exit polls), and urged Georgians to demonstrate against Shevardnadze's government and engage in nonviolent civil disobedience against the authorities. Saakashvili's UNM and Burdjanadze-Democrats united to demand the ouster of Shevardnadze and the rerun of the elections.

Massive political demonstrations were held in Tbilisi in November, with over 100,000 people participating and listening to speeches by Saakashvili and other opposition figures. The Kmara ("Enough!") youth organization (a Georgian counterpart of the Serbian " Otpor!") and several NGOs, like Liberty Institute, were active in all protest activities. After an increasingly tense two weeks of demonstrations, Shevardnadze resigned as president on 23 November, to be replaced on an interim basis by parliamentary speaker Nino Burjanadze. While the revolutionary leaders did their best to stay within the constitutional norms, many called the change of government a popular coup dubbed by Georgian media as the Rose Revolution.

Saakashvili's "storming of Georgia's parliament" in 2003 "put U.S. diplomats off guard... aakashviliousted a leader the U.S. had long backed, Eduard Shevardnadze." Seeking support, Saakashvili went outside the U.S. State Department. He hired Randy Scheunemann, then Sen. John McCain's top foreign-policy adviser, as a lobbyist and used Daniel Kunin of USAID and the NDI as a full-time adviser.

On 24 February 2004, the ''United National Movement'' and the ''United Democrats'' had amalgamated. The new political movement was named the National Movement - Democrats (NMD). The movement's main political priorities include raising pensions and providing social services to the poor, its main base of support; fighting corruption; and increasing state revenue.

First presidency

The 2004 presidential election followed President Eduard Shevardnadze's resignation as a result of the bloodless Rose Revolution. It saw very high electoral turnout with almost all (96%) the votes cast for one candidate – Mikheil Saakashvili. 1,763,000 eligible voters took part, and less than 2% of the votes cast were for other candidates.

On 4 January 2004, aged 36, Saakashvili became the youngest national president in Europe at the time. On a platform of opposing corruption and increasing pay and pensions, he promised to improve relations with the outside world. Although strongly pro-Western and planning to seek Georgian membership of NATO and the European Union, he had also spoken of the importance of better relations with Russia. He faced major problems, however, particularly Georgia's difficult economic situation and the still unresolved question of separatism in the regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Abkhazia regards itself as independent of Georgia and did not take part in the elections, while South Ossetia favours union with its northern counterpart in Russia.

Saakashvili was sworn in as president in Tbilisi on 25 January 2004. Immediately after the ceremony he signed a decree establishing a new state flag. On 26 January, in a ceremony held at the Tbilisi Kashueti Church of Saint George, he promulgated a decree granting permission for the return of the body of the first president of Georgia, Zviad Gamsakhurdia, from Grozny ( Chechen Republic) to Tbilisi and renaming a major road in the capital after Gamsakhurdia. He also released 32 Gamsakhurdia supporters (political prisoners) imprisoned by the Shevardnadze government in 1993–94. As well as a new national flag, Saakashivili authorised the adoption of a new national anthem on 20 May 2004 and a new state coat of arms on 1 October 2004.

In the first months of his presidency, Saakashvili faced a major political crisis in the southwestern Autonomous Republic of Adjara run by an authoritarian regional leader, Aslan Abashidze, who largely ignored the central Georgian government and was viewed by many as pro-Russian. The crisis threatened to develop into an armed confrontation, but Saakashvili's government managed to resolve the conflict peacefully, forcing Abashidze to resign on 6 May 2004. Success in Adjara encouraged the new president to intensify his efforts towards returning the breakaway South Ossetia to Georgian jurisdiction. The separatist authorities responded with intense militarization. Armed clashes in August 2004 led to a stalemate, and a peace plan proposed by the Georgian government in 2005 did not resolve the conflict. In late July 2006, Saakashvili's government dealt successfully with another major crisis, this time in Abkhazia's Kodori Gorge where Georgia's police forces disarmed a defiant militia led by a local warlord Emzar Kvitsiani. However, on 12 August 2008 Russo–Abkhazian forces once more gained control of the Upper Kodori Valley.

In his foreign policy, Saakashvili maintained close ties with the US and other NATO countries, remaining one of the key partners of the GUAM organization. The Saakashvili-led Rose Revolution was described by the White House as one of the most powerful movements in the modern history that had inspired others to seek freedom.

Economic and government reforms

At the time Saakashvili took office, Georgia suffered from a stagnant economy, widespread corruption by police and state officials to the point where bribery was needed for any kind of commercial transaction, high crime rates, and severe infrastructure problems, including widespread power outages, and schools and medical facilities falling into disrepair. Saakashvili set out on a massive reform programme. He systematically fired politicians, public officials, and police officers suspected of corruption and significantly raised the salaries of state employees to the point where they could depend on their salaries rather than bribes for a living. Many oligarchs who had dominated the economy were arrested, with most agreeing to pay massive fines into the state budget in exchange for their freedom. Saakashvili appointed Kakha Bendukidze as the Minister of Economy to implement economic liberalization and rapidly reformed the economy by cutting red tape which had made business difficult, courting foreign investment, simplifying the tax code, launching a privatization campaign, and tackling widespread tax evasion. Due to the establishment of a functioning taxation and customs infrastructure, the state budget increased by 300% within three years. The government massively upgraded infrastructure and public services. In particular, water and power infrastructure was improved to the point where it functioned effectively, schools and hospitals were renovated, more roads were laid, and new housing developments were built.

As a result, the rate of corruption in the country was drastically reduced and the business environment was improved significantly. The economy began growing and the standard of living rose. Georgia's ranking in the Corruption Perceptions Index by Transparency International improved dramatically from rank 133 in 2004 to 67 in 2008 and further to 51 in 2012, surpassing several EU countries. The World Bank named Georgia as the leading economic reformer in the world, and the country ranked 8th in terms of ''ease of doing business''- while most of the country's neighbours are ranked somewhere in the hundreds. The World Bank noted a significant improvement in living conditions in Georgia, reporting that "Georgia's transformation since 2003 has been remarkable. The lights are on, the streets are safe, and public services are corruption free." Doing Business report founder Simeon Dyankov has given Georgia as an example to other reformers during the annual Reformer Awards.

Under Saakashvili's term, Georgia became involved in international market transactions to a small extent, and in 2007 Bank of Georgia sold bonds at premium, when $200m five-year bond was priced with a coupon of 9 per cent at par, or 100 per cent of face value, after initially being priced at 9.5 per cent and investors pushed orders up to $600m.

In 2009, he introduced The Economic Liberty Act of Georgia, which was adopted by the Parliament of Georgia in 2011. The Act restricted the state's ability to interfere in the economy, and was aimed at reducing the state expenses and debt by 30% and 60%, respectively. It also explicitly prohibited the Government from changing taxes without a popular referendum on rates and structure.

Due to his government's economic reforms, Georgia's economy grew 70% between 2003 and 2013, and per capita income roughly tripled. However, poverty only marginally declined. At the end of his second term, about a quarter of the population was still poor, and unemployment was at 15%.

Law and order

On 27 March 2006, the government announced that it had prevented a nationwide prison riot plotted by criminal kingpins. The police operation ended with the deaths of 7 inmates and at least 17 injuries. While the opposition cast doubts over the official version and demanded an independent investigation, the ruling party was able to vote down such initiatives.

Despite this, Saakashvili's government also eased the legal system in some respects. His government decriminalized libel and pushed through legislation upholding freedom of speech, although he was accused of stifling the media and using the judicial system to go after his political opponents in spite of this. In December 2006, Saakashvili signed a constitutional amendment completely abolishing the death penalty in law.

Military reforms

Saakashvili's government massively increased military spending to modernize the Georgian Armed Forces, which were small and poorly equipped and trained at the time he entered office. By 2007, the military budget had increased twenty-fold since 1999. New weapons and vehicles were purchased, military salaries were raised, new bases were built, and Georgian soldiers engaged in joint training exercises with the US military.

Education reform

When Saakashvili took office, the university entrance system was bribe-based, with a university spot costing up to $50,000 in 2003. His government introduced a common entrance exam, replacing the bribe-based system with a merit-based one. The quality of university education also improved. Despite this, Saakashvili was accused of failing to reform the quality of primary and secondary-level school education, which reportedly remained low at the end of his term in office.

Health reforms

After Georgian independence, the government found that its Soviet-style centralized healthcare system was underfunded and failing. State-run centralized medical facilities were typically inefficient and in need of renovation and technological upgrades. As a result, the government privatized almost all public hospitals and clinics, and the insurance system was deregulated, with private insurance companies able to offer coverage. Only a few specialized facilities for mental health and infectious diseases remained in government hands, and the state continued to provide health insurance for those below the poverty line, whose insurance was paid for by public funds and provided by private insurers, and some civil servants, amounting to about 40% of the population. As a result, the level of healthcare greatly improved, with new hospitals and clinics beginning to replace older facilities. However, a portion of the population was left uninsured, as it could not afford private insurance and did not qualify for public insurance.

Foreign relations

Saakashvili saw NATO membership as necessary for the stability of Georgia. He offered an intensified dialogue with the ''de facto'' Abkhaz and Ossetian authorities. Until the 2008 South Ossetia war, a diplomatic solution was thought possible. Saakashvili's administration doubled the number of its troops in Iraq, making Georgia one of the biggest supporters of Coalition Forces, and keeping its troops in Kosovo and Afghanistan to "contribute to what it describe as global security".

Saakashvili's government maintained diplomatic relations with other Caucasian states and western-oriented nearby countries such as Armenia, Azerbaijan, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Turkey and Ukraine. In 2004, Saakashvili visited Israel to attend the official opening of the Modern Energy Problems Research Center, and Dr. Brenda Schaffer, the director of the centre, described Saakashvili as the Nelson Mandela of the 21st century. That August, Saakashvili, who holds an honorary doctorate from the University of Haifa, travelled to Israel again to attend the opening of the official Week of Georgian-Jewish Friendship, held under the auspices of the Georgian president, for which the Jewish leaders were invited as honoured guests.

Relations with the United States were good, but were complicated by Saakashvili's "volatile" behaviour. Former and current US officials characterized the Georgian president as "difficult to manage". They criticized his "risky moves", that had often "caught the U.S. unprepared" while leaving it "exposed diplomatically".

Saakashvili's ties with the US go back to 1991 (see Early life and career). Biographies of Thomas Jefferson and John F. Kennedy could be found in his office, next to biographies of Joseph Stalin and Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and books on war. Seeking US support, Saakashvili went outside the United States Department of State and established contacts with Sen. John McCain and forces seeking NATO expansion.

Saakashvili believed that the long-term priority for the country was to advance its membership in the European Community. During a meeting with Javier Solana, he said that, in contrast with new and old European states, Georgia is an Ancient European state.

Assassination attempt

On 10 May 2005, while U.S. President George W. Bush was giving a speech in Tbilisi's Freedom Square, Vladimir Arutyunian threw a live hand grenade at where Saakashvili and Bush were sitting. It landed in the crowd about from the podium after hitting a girl and did not detonate. Arutyunian was arrested in July of that year, but before his capture, he managed to kill one law enforcement agent. He was convicted of the attempted assassinations of Saakashvili and Bush and the murder of the agent, and given a life sentence.

2007 crisis

The late Georgian businessman Badri Patarkatsishvili claimed that pressure had been exerted on his financial interests after Imedi Television broadcast several accusations against officials. On 25 September 2007, former defence minister Irakli Okruashvili accused the president of planning Patarkatsishvili's murder. Okruashvili was detained two days later on charges of extortion, money laundering, and abuse of office. However, on 8 October 2007 the General Prosecutor's Office released a videotaped confession, in which Okruashvili pleaded guilty to large-scale bribery through extortion and negligence while serving as minister. He also retracted his accusations against the president and said that he made them to gain political benefit at the request of Badri Patarkatsishvili. Okruashvili's lawyer and other opposition leaders said this retraction had been made under duress.

Georgia faced the worst crisis since the Rose Revolution. Okruashvili's accusations against the president and his allies sparked a series of anti-government demonstrations in October, climaxing early in November. They involved several opposition groups and the influential media tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili. Although the demonstrations rapidly faded, the government's decision to use police force against the remaining protesters evolved into clashes in the streets of Tbilisi on 7 November. The President's declaration of a state of emergency (7–16 November) and the restrictions imposed on some mass media sources led to harsh criticism of the Saakashvili government both in Georgia and abroad. Human Rights Watch criticized the Georgian government for using "excessive" force against protesters in November and International Crisis Group warned of growing authoritarianism.

Patarkatsishvili's opposition television station, Imedi, was shut down in November 2007, after the authorities accused it of complicity with the plot to overthrow the elected government. It resumed broadcasts a few weeks after the incident, but did not broadcast news or talk shows until after the election. The station was later sold to supporters of the Saakashvili government and some Georgian journalists have called for it to be handed back.

On 8 November 2007, President Saakashvili announced a compromise solution to hold early presidential elections on 5 January 2008. He also proposed to hold a simultaneous plebiscite about when to hold parliamentary polls – in spring as pushed for by the opposition parties, or in late 2008. Several concessions in the election code were also made to the opposition.

On 23 November 2007, the ruling United National Movement party officially nominated Saakashvili as its candidate for the upcoming elections. Pursuant to the Constitution of Georgia, Saakashvili resigned on 25 November to launch his pre-election campaign for early presidential polls.

Second presidency

2008 presidential election

On 5 January 2008, an early presidential election was held nationwide, with the exception of the highland village of Shatili, where the polling station was not opened due to high levels of snowfall. In a televised address, President Saakashvili had proposed to hold the election earlier than called for by the Georgian constitution in order to resolve the political tension surrounding opposition-led demonstrations, their suppression by the government on 7 November 2007, and the closure of the most popular opposition television network, Imedi. Saakashvili said in his presidential address that "these elections will be held according to our timing, and not that of our ill-wishers."

Changes in the Cabinet

Saakashvili publicly announced his plans of modernising the Cabinet of Georgia well before Georgian presidential elections. Shortly after being re-elected, the president formally re-appointed the Prime Minister of Georgia Lado Gurgenidze and asked him to present a renewed cabinet to the Parliament of Georgia for final approval.

Gurgenidze changed most ministers, leaving Ivane Merabishvili, controversial Minister for Home Affairs, Defence Minister Davit Kezerashvili and Minister of Finance Nika Gilauri on their former positions. Gia Nodia was appointed as the Minister of Education and Science. Zaza Gamcemlidze, former director of Tbilisi Botanic Garden, took over the position of the Minister of Natural Resources and Nature Protection. Famous archaeologist, and already the eldest minister in the cabinet, Iulon Gagoshidze was appointed on a newly designated position of the Minister of State for Diasporas.

Parliamentary elections held during Saakashvili's second term were condemned by the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe election monitoring mission for being marred by ballot stuffing, violence against opposition campaigners, uncritical coverage of the president and his party from the state-controlled media, and public officials openly campaigning for the president's party.

On 28 October 2008, Saakashvili proposed Grigol Mgaloblishvili, Georgian ambassador to Turkey for the premiership. According to the President, Gurgenidze had initially agreed to serve only for a year and that Georgia was facing new challenges which needed new approach. The Parliament of Georgia approved Mgaloblishvili as the premier on 1 November 2008.

Demonstrations against Saakashvili spread across Georgia in 2009, 2011 and 2012.

Russo-Georgian War

On 22 February 2008, Saakashvili held an official meeting with the President of Russia Vladimir Putin, in his residence in Novo-Ogaryovo. The presidents discussed the issues of aviation regulations between the two countries. This was Putin's last meeting in his second term as the President of Russia, being succeeded by Dimitry Medvedev shortly thereafter.

However, after a series of clashes between Georgians and South Ossetians, Russian military forces intervened on the side of the South Ossetian separatists in response to the Georgian attack on Tskhinvali and invaded Gori in Shida Kartli. The two counterparts were led to a ceasefire agreement and a six-point peace plan, due to the French President's mediation. On 26 August 2008, the Russian president, Dmitry Medvedev, signed a decree recognizing Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent states. Also on 26 August, in response to Russia's recognition of Abkhazia and South Ossetia, Deputy Foreign Minister Grigol Vashadze announced that Georgia had broken diplomatic relations with Russia.

Medvedev held Saakashvili responsible for the Russo-Georgian War, and states that Saakashvili is responsible for the collapse of the Georgian state.

The Georgian military's capabilities were severely damaged by the war, and Saakashvili's government moved to rebuild them, massively increasing military spending. By late 2010, the Georgian military reached a strength greater than that of pre-war levels, after which military spending declined again. Although the Georgian government bought large amounts of arms and military equipment from abroad, it also began to seriously invest in an indigenous military industry. Starting in 2010, Georgia began to manufacture its own line of armoured vehicles, artillery systems, small arms, and unmanned aerial vehicles.

2009 opposition demonstrations and armed mutiny

The pressure against Saakashvili intensified in 2009, when the opposition launched mass demonstrations against Saakashvili's rule. On 5 May 2009, Georgian police said large-scale disorders were planned in Georgia of which the failed army mutiny was part. According to the police, Saakashvili's assassination had also been plotted. Opposition figures dispute the claim of an attempted mutiny and instead say that troops refused an illegal order to use force against opposition demonstrators.

End of presidency

On 2 October 2012, Saakashvili admitted defeat in Georgia's parliamentary election against Bidzina Ivanishvili in the election the day before. He was barred from seeking a third term in the 2013 presidential election. Saakashvili left Georgia shortly after the election.

In December 2013, Saakashvili accepted the position of lecturer and senior statesman at Tufts University in the United States.

Legal prosecution (in Georgia) since the end of presidency

On 23 March 2014, when Saakashvili was summoned to give testimony to the main prosecutor's office of Georgia, the office planned to interrogate him about the pardoning in 2008 of four high-ranking officials of the Department of Constitutional Security of the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs – Gia Alania, Avtandil Aptsiauri, Alexander Gachava and Mikhail Bibiluridze, who were convicted for causing the death of bank employee Sandro Girgvliani on 28 January 2006, as well as for unlawful actions against his friend Levan Bukhaidze. He was also to be questioned as a witness for nine criminal cases, including the death of the Prime Minister of Georgia Zurab Zhvania in 2005.

On 28 July 2014, criminal charges were filed by the Georgian prosecutor's office against Saakashvili over allegedly "exceeding official powers" during the 2007 Georgian demonstrations, as well as a police raid on and "seizure" of Imedi TV and other assets owned by the late tycoon Badri Patarkatsishvili. Saakashvili, then in Hungary, responded by accusing the Georgian authorities of political score-settling and attempts at appeasing Russia. The United States expressed concerns over the case and warned that "the legal system should not be used as a tool of political retribution". The European Union stated that it took "note with concern" and it will "closely monitor these and other legal proceedings against members of the former government and current opposition in Georgia".

On 2 August 2014, Tbilisi City Court ordered pre-trial detention in absentia for Saakashvili and the co-accused Zurab Adeishvili (chief prosecutor in 2007) and Davit Kezerashvili (defense minister in 2007), with a preliminary hearing appointed for September 2014.

On 13 August 2014, Saakashvili was charged with embezzling budget funds. On 14 August, an internal search was declared, and on 31 August, the procedure for declaring an international search was launched. On 1 August 2015, Interpol refused to declare Saakashvili on the international wanted list, as the Georgian authorities demanded. In September, the property of the Saakashvili family was seized. His personal bank accounts in Georgia were also seized.

In March 2015, Ukraine denied a Georgian request to extradite Saakashvili, as it deemed the criminal cases against him politically motivated. Saakashvili stated on 1 June 2015 that he had given up (three days before) Georgian citizenship to avoid "guaranteed imprisonment" in Georgia. The Constitution of Ukraine forbids the extradition of Ukrainians to other states.

On 8 August 2017, the Georgian General Prosecutor's Office claimed Saakashvili would face up to 11 years of imprisonment (charges included the spending of public funding on personal needs, abuse of power during the dispersal of a demonstration on 7 November 2007, the beating of former MP Valery Gelashvili and the raid of Imedi TV). On 18 August 2017, Georgia requested Ukraine to extradite Saakashvili. On 5 September, the Ukrainian authorities confirmed that they had received the request from Georgia.

On 5 January 2018, the Tbilisi City Court sentenced Saakashvili to three-year imprisonment in absentia for abusing power in pardoning the former Interior Ministry officials convicted in the 2006 Sandro Girgvliani murder case. On 28 June 2018, the Tbilisi City Court found Saakashvili guilty of abusing his authority as president by trying to cover up evidence related to the 2005 beating of opposition lawmaker Valery Gelashvili and sentenced him in absentia to six years in prison. Saakashvili and his supporters denounced the verdict as politically motivated.

After returning to Georgia in 2021, Saakashvili was additionally charged for illegal border crossing.

Ukraine

Saakashvili energetically supported Ukraine's Euromaidan movement and its Revolution of Dignity. On 7 March 2014, Saakashvili authored an op-ed piece entitled "When Putin invaded my country", in the context of the turmoil in Ukraine after the ouster on 22 February of President Viktor Yanukovych and before the 16 March referendum in the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation.

In November 2013, Saakashvili moved to Williamsburg, Brooklyn, New York.

Governor of Odesa

On 13 February 2015, Saakashvili was appointed by the president of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, as head of the International Advisory Council on Reforms—an advisory body whose main task is working out proposals and recommendations for implementation and introduction of reforms in Ukraine based on best international practices. On 30 May 2015, Poroshenko appointed Saakashvili Governor of Odesa Oblast (region). On the previous day, 29 May 2015, he was granted Ukrainian citizenship. A month before this appointment, Saakashvili had stated that he had turned down the post of First Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine because in order to fulfill that post, he would have had to become a Ukrainian citizen and renounce his Georgian citizenship. Saakashvili stated on 1 June 2015 that he had now changed his mind to avoid "guaranteed imprisonment" in Georgia and to defend Georgian interest through his governorship in Odesa. Also on 1 June, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Georgia stated that the appointment of Saakashvili would not have a negative impact on the relations between Georgia and Ukraine. But in reality, after this appointment, relations between the two countries soured. On 4 December 2015, Saakashvili was stripped of his Georgian citizenship due to restrictions on dual nationality under Georgian law. Saakashvili claimed that this was done to prevent him from leading the United National Movement in the 2016 Georgian parliamentary election.Ex-Georgian President Stripped of Citizenship
''New York Times'' (4 December 2015).

A poll by Sociological group "RATING" showed that in October 2015, Saakashvili was the most popular politician in Ukraine (43% viewed him positively).

In December 2015, Saakashvili started an anti-corruption NGO ''Movement for Purification''. Among rumours that this NGO would be transformed into a political force, Saakashvili stated he did not have the intention to create a new political party.
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* In the autumn of 2015, informal attempts and negotiations were launched to form a political party around Saakashvili with members of the parliamentary group Interfactional Union "Eurooptimists", Democratic Alliance and possibly Self Reliance, but this project collapsed in June 2016.

Saakashvili submitted his resignation as governor on 7 November 2016 citing corruption in Ukraine as a main reason. In a press conference this same day, he claimed that President Poroshenko personally supported "corruption clans in the Odesa region" and that the "Odesa region is being handed over not only to corrupt people, but also to enemies of Ukraine." On 9 November 2016, President Poroshenko accepted Saakashvili's resignation (as governor) and dismissed him as his freelance adviser.
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Movement of New Forces

On 11 November 2016, Saakashvili announced his goal to create a new political party called " Movement of New Forces" and that "our goal is early parliamentary elections to be carried out as quickly as possible in the shortest possible time." In late February 2017, the Ministry of Justice of Ukraine registered Movement of New Forces officially as a political party.

According to a poll by Sociological group "RATING", 18% viewed Saakashvili positively in April 2017.

In Ukraine, only Ukrainian citizens can lead political parties or be elected to its parliament.

Stripping of Ukrainian citizenship

On 26 July 2017, President Poroshenko issued a decree stripping Saakashvili of his Ukrainian citizenship, but without a reason for his doing so being stated. Ukraine's migration service said in a statement that "according to the Constitution of Ukraine, the president takes decisions on who is stripped of Ukrainian citizenship based on the conclusions of the citizenship commission". Saakashvili, in response to his being stripped of citizenship, replied: "I have only one citizenship, that of Ukraine, and I will not be deprived of it! Now there is an attempt under way to force me to become a refugee. This will not happen! I will fight for my legal right to return to Ukraine!" A Ukrainian legislator from the Petro Poroshenko Bloc faction in parliament, Serhiy Leshchenko, said that Saakashvili was (when Poroshenko issued his decree) in the United States, but that if he sought to return to Ukraine, he would face extradition to Georgia to face charges for alleged crimes that occurred during his presidency there. According to ''The Economist'', most observers saw Poroshenko's stripping Saakashvili of his citizenship "simply as the sidelining of a political rival" ( at the time political polls gave Saakashvili's political party Movement of New Forces around 2% in a hypothetical early election). On 28 July 2017, Saakashvili told ''Newshour'' he wanted to return to Ukraine to "get rid of the old corrupt elite" there.

On 4 August, Saakashvili appeared in Poland; he left the country 4 days later travelling to Lithuania claiming "I'll be travelling across Europe." Saakashvili announced on 16 August that he will return to Ukraine on 10 September (2017) through the Krakovets checkpoint and urged people to meet him at the checkpoint.

On 10 September, the train on which Saakashvili tried to enter Ukraine was held at a railway station in Przemysl, Poland. Then, on the same day, he travelled by bus to the Medyka- Shehyni border crossing, where he was allowed to pass through a Polish checkpoint on the border with Ukraine, but then temporarily blocked from reaching the Ukrainian checkpoint by a line of border guards standing arm-in-arm. Finally, a crowd broke through from the Ukrainian side and took Saakashvili into Ukraine. On 12 September, in the Leopolis Hotel in Lviv, the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine acquainted Saakashvili with the protocol on the administrative violation of "Illegal crossing or attempted illegal crossing of the state border of Ukraine."

At a rally in the western Ukrainian city of Chernivtsi on 13 September, Saakashvili announced that he would return to Kyiv on 19 September after travelling to several other cities to rally support.

On 22 September, the Mostysky District Court of the Lviv region found Saakashvili guilty of illegally crossing the state border. Under the court's decision, he must pay a fine of 200 non-taxable minimums (3400 hryvni).

In the first half of 2017, and in December 2018 and January 2019, Saakashvili hosted political talk shows on the TV channel " Zik". Saakashvili claims his programme was axed in 2019 because his view on Yulia Tymoshenko's candidacy for the 2019 Ukrainian presidential election was distorted (he claimed to support her candidacy while his TV show suggested the exact opposite).

Legal prosecution (in Ukraine)

On 5 December 2017, Saakashvili (who was leading anti-government protests at the time) was temporarily detained by Ukraine's Security Service on the roof of his apartment building in central Kyiv and his apartment was searched. He was freed from police by a large group of protesters. Saakashvili's lawyer reported that the politician had been detained for attempting to overthrow Ukraine's constitutional system, whilst the SBU accused Saakashvili of receiving financing from a "criminal group" linked to ousted (during the Revolution of Dignity) Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych. On 8 December, General Prosecutor of Ukraine Yuriy Lutsenko announced that National Police officers had found the location of Saakashvili, detained him and placed him in a temporary detention centre. The following day, Saakashvili began an indefinite hunger strike, claiming to oppose any attempts at compulsory feeding. On 11 December, a Ukrainian court released him from detention.

On 12 February 2018, Saakashvili was deported to Poland. The Ukrainian border service stated "This person was on Ukrainian territory illegally and therefore, in compliance with all legal procedures, he was returned to the country from where he arrived". Saakashvili was subsequently banned from entering Ukraine until 2021 by the Ukrainian border service. Saakashvili claimed that his Georgian bodyguards and supporters had in recent months been kidnapped, tortured and deported to Georgia. On 14 February 2018, Saakashvili showed up in the Netherlands, having been granted permanent residency there on the basis of family reunification.

Return to Ukraine

In May 2019, Ukraine's new president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, restored Saakashvili's Ukrainian citizenship. On 29 May 2019, Saakashvili returned to Ukraine; but he soon stated that he had no political ambitions in Ukraine.

On 4 June, Kyiv Mayor Vitali Klitschko

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