Former Georgian Prime Minister Hospitalised After Beating, Blames Government

Former Georgian PM Giorgi Gakharia Hospitalized After Assault

By Lucy Papachristou

(Reuters) - Giorgi Gakharia, a former prime minister of Georgia who now leads one of the country's main opposition groups, was hospitalised after being severely beaten late on Tuesday, a spokeswoman for his party told Reuters.

Ana Buchukuri said Gakharia had sustained injuries on his face and head during an assault by several men at a hotel lobby in Batumi, a city on the Black Sea coast.

"He was brutally beaten but survived," she said.

Gakharia said his health was stable in a Facebook post on Wednesday.

His party, For Georgia, called the assault a "brutal, coordinated group attack" and said the government was to blame.

"This politically motivated attack is a blatant attempt to intimidate the opposition and suppress dissenting voices," the party said in a statement quoted by the Interpress news agency.

Georgia has been plunged into political crisis following an October parliamentary election which the opposition charges was stolen by the ruling Georgian Dream (GD) party. GD, in power since 2012, denies any wrongdoing. 

Georgians have staged nightly protests in the capital Tbilisi and other cities since November, when the government said it would freeze European Union accession talks until 2028. 

The pro-EU protests have been met with a crackdown by police, with rights groups pointing to hundreds of arrests and beatings. The government has defended the police's actions.

"Physical retaliation and the incitement of violence against citizens by members of the 'Georgian Dream' party have become part of the political landscape," the Georgian Young Lawyers' Association, a rights group, said in a statement on Gakharia's assault.

"The ineffective response of the investigative bodies and the practical neglect of crimes committed against demonstrators, journalists, and political party representatives exacerbate the criminal situation in the country."

A spokesman for Georgian Dream did not immediately reply to a Reuters request for comment.

The attack on Gakharia, who served as Georgia's prime minister from 2019 until 2021, follows on the heels of other assaults on opposition figures and well-known journalists in recent months.

Nika Gvaramia, the leader of the Coalition for Change party, was knocked to the ground and fell unconscious while being detained by police in December in Tbilisi. He was later jailed for 12 days for petty hooliganism and disobeying police.

Buchukuri, the spokeswoman, said the identities of Gakharia's attackers have not been determined and the party has requested any hotel security footage be handed over to police.

(Reporting and writing by Lucy Papachristou, Editing by William Maclean)