Saakashvili can return home - Georgian prime minister
TBILISI. Feb 26 (Interfax) - Former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili can freely return to his home country, says Georgian Prime Minister Irakly Garibashvili, who is currently visiting the United States.
"He left the country after the presidential elections. I cannot say the people are missing him, but he can certainly come back. He so far has a valid Georgian passport," Georgian media quoted Garibashvili as saying in their Wednesday issues.
Saakashvili said in a live interview from Kyiv shown on Rustavi 2 television on Tuesday that he misses Georgia but has chosen to leave for the United States for a number of reasons.
"I will talk openly about these reasons in due time," Saakashvili said.
Meanwhile, the Georgian weekly Asaval-Dasavali reported on Wednesday that the investigation into the circumstances of former Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania's death in February 2005 has been completed, but the prosecution authorities are not hurrying to make its findings public, as "former President Mikheil Saakashvili's immediate involvement in Zurab Zhvania's murder has been discovered."
The weekly claims with reference to a prosecution source that Zhvania had in fact been killed in the Shavnabada presidential residence outside Tbilisi in Saakashvili's and then Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili's presence. After that, his body was transported to an apartment in Tbilisi in a TV set box, where his death from carbon monoxide poisoning was faked.
"There is a clandestine audio record in which Saakashvili's voice is heard saying 'Now remove this corpse and do what was agreed upon'," the weekly reports.
The Georgian Chief Prosecutor's Office told Interfax that it would not give any comments on the matter as the investigation into Zhvania's death had not yet been completed.