David Kezerashvili knows better than most what standing up to Russia entails. He helped to overthrow the Kremlin-aligned Georgian government during the 2003 Rose Revolution. Then he served as Georgia’s defence minister for two years including when Russia invaded in 2008. He eventually fled to London in 2012 when the Kremlin-backed Georgian Dream government accused him of embezzling $5.2 million in state funds. Seven criminal charges were levelled against him, including extortion and money laundering. None was upheld in court, until two years ago when the country’s Supreme Court overturned the embezzlement acquittal, sentencing him in absentia to ten years in prison.
‘Without calling my defence, in a few hours the Supreme Court decided I was guilty’
When we meet in The Spectator’s offices, Kezerashvili, who owns Georgia’s pro-democracy television channel, Formula TV, insists the charges are trumped up, the result of a politically motivated campaign against him. Courts in both Britain and France have refused requests from Georgia to extradite him.
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