Epress.am News from Armenia
Ekaterine Khvedelidze, wife of Georgian opposition financier Bidzina Ivanishvili, is suing Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili (pictured) after he wrongfully revoked her citizenship, Georgia’s Democracy & Freedom Watch reports. According to Georgia Online, the amount being requested as compensation for “moral damages” is 20,000 GEL (about $12,000 USD).
Saakashvili revoked Khvedelidze’s Georgian citizenship last October, at a time when her husband had just declared that he would challenge the president’s power in the country. Revoking the couple’s citizenship temporarily blocked their ascent to power, because a non-Georgian is not allowed to engage in politics according to Georgian legislation.
But a court in Tbilisi ruled that Saakashvili had acted unlawfully when it came to Khvedelidze, and the president was asked to compensate legal fees in the amount of 100 GEL (about $60 USD). Khvedelidze is now a Georgian citizen.
The official reason for revoking the couple’s citizenship was that they became citizens of a foreign country after they becoming Georgian citizens. In the case of Ekaterine Khvedelidze, this was untrue: she was a citizen of France before (and not after) she received her Georgian citizenship.
In regards to Ivanishvili’s citizenship, the court upheld Saakashvili’s decision. He is therefore still barred from politics, but his wife may do so, and has said she will head the party, which will officially be established in the near future, together with Ivanishvili’s political partners, the Free Democrats, the Republicans, National Forum and several individual politicians, to form a coalition.