The third president of Georgia, Mikheil Saakashvili, was found guilty of illegally crossing the border and sentenced to four years and six months in prison. Taking into account the three previous sentences, the politician's total prison term is 12.5 years, Mtavari reports. Thus, he will serve his sentence until April 1, 2034.

The ex-president, who was wanted, returned to Georgia in a cargo trailer with dairy products that arrived by ship from the Ukrainian city of Chornomorsk to the port of Poti. He was detained on October 1, 2021.

Recall that last week, a Tbilisi court sentenced Mikheil Saakashvili to nine years in prison in a case of embezzlement of more than 8.8 million lari from the state budget between September 2009 and February 2013. In addition, he previously received six years in prison for two other sentences: he was found guilty of beating MP Valeri Gelashvili and illegally pardoning the murderers of United Bank of Georgia employee Sandro Girgvliani. Another case against the politician remains pending - regarding the dispersal of an opposition rally in Tbilisi in 2007 and the seizure of the Imedi television company.

Mikheil Saakashvili himself considers all the charges brought against him to be politically motivated. Recently, he stated that the third sentence, like the previous ones, was handed down to him on the personal order of the founder of the country's ruling party, Bidzina Ivanishvili. In his Facebook post, he appealed to the international community to fight against the injustices happening in Georgia.

The former president has also repeatedly stated that his health has sharply deteriorated during his imprisonment. Representatives of the opposition, the fifth president of Georgia, Salome Zurabishvili, and Western politicians have spoken out in his defense. The country's authorities, in turn, claim that all decisions regarding Saakashvili are made within the framework of the law.