A Ukrainian court has ruled that the materials of a criminal case opened by the Georgian Prosecutor General's Office against Georgian citizen Oleg Melnikov, who is in custody at a Kyiv-based pre-trial detention facility, lack evidence, and it has refused to order the extradition of Melnikov to Georgia.
Georgian media reported on Friday referring to sources in Ukraine
that the court in Kyiv extended Melnikov’s custody by 12 months.
The Prosecutor General’s Office of Georgia accused former high
official of the constitutional security department of the Georgian
Interior Ministry, Oleg Melnikov, of abuse of power, as well as being
involved in the murder of Georgian citizen Sandro Girgvliani in 2006.
The Georgian prosecutor’s office put Melnikov on the international
wanted list following his departure from Georgia on December 2, 2012. On
December 7, 2012, the ex-official was detained in Kyiv.
Apart from Melnikov, the former head of the constitutional security
department, Data Ahalaya, and officials from the department – Soso
Topuridze and Geronty Alaniya – were also put on international wanted
list on the same case.
