Saakashvili's Exit from Ukraine: Internal Probe Ends in Disciplinary Punishment for Border Guards

The State Border Guard Service did not say what the disciplinary punishment consists of.

Ukraine's State Border Guard Service has disciplined several officials following an internal inspection into the possible illegal crossing of the border by Ukrainian citizen Mikheil Saakashvili. 

Disciplinary punishment

A spokesperson for the State Border Guard Service told UP that an internal investigation had been conducted by the State Border Guard Service administration into the circumstances of the possible illegal crossing of the state border by Ukrainian citizen Saakashvili. 

Andriy Demchenko
State Border Guard Service spokesperson

During the investigation, senior officials of the border unit, the border detachment and the Southern Regional Directorate were suspended from their duties. I cannot disclose all the details of the investigation, as the materials contain restricted information, but I will note that they have been sent to the relevant pre-trial investigation body, which has opened criminal proceedings on this fact.

He noted that, based on the results of the investigation, a number of officials from the above-mentioned units and bodies of the State Border Guard Service have been subjected to disciplinary liability. 

However, the State Border Guard Service did not say what the disciplinary punishment consists of, or how many people it affected (in such cases, it usually involves reprimands or demotion in rank or position — ed.). 

The border guards also did not answer whether the fact of Saakashvili's illegal border crossing had been established, citing the ongoing proceedings. According to UP, the case was opened by a unit of the National Police, whose jurisdiction includes investigating cases of illegal transportation of people across the border. 

How the investigation proceeded

Recall that in early October it became known that the State Border Guard Service was conducting an internal inspection into the fact of Saakashvili's border crossing, and several officials had been suspended from their posts. 

Andriy Demchenko
State Border Guard Service spokesperson

In the case of Ukrainian citizen Saakashvili, the State Border Guard Service is indeed conducting an internal inspection. The circumstances of his departure from Ukraine and the fact of crossing the state border are being investigated. All information on how he left Ukraine is being thoroughly checked. 

Demchenko stated that several officials of the Southern Regional Directorate among the leadership were suspended from performing their official duties during the investigation and until its conclusions. 

Recall that Mikheil Saakashvili secretly travelled from Ukraine to Georgia ahead of the municipal elections held on October 2. Media reports said the former President of Georgia illegally crossed Ukraine's state border by hiding in a freight container on a ferry that arrived from the Ukrainian city of Chornomorsk to the Georgian port of Poti. 

In 2018, former Georgian President Saakashvili was found guilty in two cases: he was sentenced to three years in prison for pardoning former Interior Ministry employees convicted in the Sandro Girgvliani case, and to six years in the case of beating former MP Valeri Gelashvili. 

According to Georgia's prosecutor's office, upon the politician's arrival in the country on October 1, another criminal case was opened against him for illegally crossing the Georgian border. This is already the fifth criminal case against him.