TBILISI – Former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili, who has been stripped of Ukrainian citizenship, has said that he will fight for the opportunity to return to Ukraine.
Saakashvili said in a recently published video address that the decision to strip him of Ukrainian citizenship was sending a message to society that “the games under the name of democracy will not continue in Ukraine.”
“(Ukrainian President Petro) Poroshenko has paid his recent visit to Georgia not to establish ties between the two countries but to strike agreements between the two oligarchic regimes, agreements between Ukrainian Poroshenko and Gazprom’s major shareholder – Georgian oligarch in this Russian project (Bidzina) Ivanishvili,” Saakashvili said in the video address posted on Facebook.
Saakashvili also told Poroshenko that he did not intend to seek refugee status in order to return to Ukraine.
“Despite your signature, my heart belongs to Ukraine,” he said.
Saakashvili said earlier that he had been living in Ukraine for more than 13 years and had taken part in three revolutions.
“I have only one citizenship – Ukrainian citizenship, and they will not be able to deprive me of it,” he said.
It was reported that Poroshenko had signed a decree stripping former Georgian President and former Odesa Region Governor Saakashvili of Ukrainian citizenship. The relevant information appeared on the website of the Ukrainian State Migration Service on Wednesday.
Saakashvili said on his Facebook account on Wednesday that he was now staying in the United States.
