EMPATHY CENTRE Press Release 27/01/2023

Due to the high public interest, we once again respond to the briefing of Rati Bregadze, the Minister of Justice, which was held on 26/01/2023.

At the briefing he stated that

1. “In order to establish the truth”, the Special Penitentiary Service applied to the Samkharauli National Forensics Bureau with the request to carry out an expert examination of the EMPATHY CENTRE report regarding Mikheil Saakashvili’s state of health.
2. He stated that from the gastroenterological, neurological and psychiatric point of view, the diagnoses established by the EMPATHY CENTRE are not “accurate and reliable”
3. According to the Legislation of Georgia, an expert does not have a right to talk about torture, etc.

In this regard, we hereby state:

1. The legal basis for drawing up a conclusion on an expert conclusion is questionable and indicates the biased status of the Ministry of Justice. We are not aware of a similar fact in case of any other prisoner.
2. Gastroenterological and neurological diagnoses as of 08/12/2022 correspond to the diagnoses made at the Vivamed clinic and at the Gori hospital. Therefore, the minister’s statement is, at least, not true.
3. As for psychiatric diagnoses: it was confirmed by 4 psychiatrists (2 Georgian psychiatrists, 1 American and 1 English psychiatrist), and also by 1 Georgian and 1 American neurologists: based on clinical, anamnestic/catamnestic, psychometric, clinical-psychological and instrumental studies. The diagnoses were also confirmed in the report of the Public Defender’s expert group N7 (06/12/2022), which was submitted to the court. It is also unclear how a mental state of a person can be evaluated without a personal examination.
4. As for the experts’ statements about “torture”, in the opinion of the Minister of Justice, this “does not comply with the legislation of Georgia” – the Minister of Justice refers to the Order #1208, issued in 1978 in Moscow, USSR, that is currently still followed by the Samkharauli Bureau.
5. Here we would like to remind the public that the State Investigation Service is currently studying the facts of ill treatment of Mikheil Saakashvili in the penitentiary system, while the Minister of Justice and the high officials of the penitentiary service, including the current head of the medical service Urtkmelidze, the head of the Gori hospital at that time, are subjects of this investigation, and thus can be regarded as the party to the case.
6. And finally, the EMPATHY CENTRE is still expecting the above conclusion of the Samkharauli Bureau on our After having received that conclusion, the group of experts will hold a press conference, and conduct expert examination of that conclusion with participation of international experts.
7. We see the actions of Rati Bregadze, the Minister of Justice, as an attempt to put pressure on the Empathy NGO and the group of experts, as well as an attempt to influence the court, discredit and damage the reputation of local and international experts.