Georgia may request extradition of its former President Mikheil Saakashvili from the United States, the country’s Justice Minister Tea Tsulukiani said.
"If Ukraine obtains political will, the country will be able to decide on handing over Saakashvili. As for other countries, the United States for example, if the ex-president stays there, we will need legal consultations with the country, including talks and an agreement regarding extradition," the Georgian Channel One cited Tsulukiani as saying.
In November 2013, Saakashvili left Georgia. Georgian prosecution pressed criminal charges against Saakashvili in absentia, accusing him of embezzling immense sums from the state budget for personal use.
In May 2015, Saakashvili was appointed governor of the Ukraine’s Odessa region and stripped of his Georgian citizenship upon receiving a Ukrainian passport. However, Saakashvili resigned in November 2016, stating that the Ukrainian authorities did not want to fight corruption. Poroshenko revoked his citizenship when it was discovered that Saakashvili had violated Ukrainian law by providing incorrect information on his citizenship application.
