Egor Kochiev, head of the de facto South Ossetian delegation at the Incident Prevention and Response Mechanism (IPRM) meetings, stated that Georgian citizens Sergo Merabashvili and Iason Gengiuri, who were arrested for attempting to damage a "border sign" near the occupation line, face up to 5 years in prison.
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"A criminal case has been initiated against them, and the Tskhinvali City Court has sentenced them to two months of imprisonment as a preventive measure. They face up to five years of imprisonment under Article 322, Part 3 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation, which pertains to the illegal crossing of the state border by a group of persons acting in prior agreement," local media quoted Kochiev as saying.
Sergo Merabashvili and Iason Gengiuri, residents of the village of Patara Mejvriskhevi in the Gori municipality, were arrested on September 16 near the occupied village of Ghrom, adjacent to Mejvriskhevi, by representatives of the occupation forces.
Sapa Tskhinvali, citing a source, reported on October 3 that the Georgian citizens had become heavily intoxicated before illegally crossing the South Ossetian border and attempting to dismantle a border information sign, which was filmed on a phone. Sapa also published a video.
Initial reports that the detained Georgian citizens were soon "deported" to the Tbilisi-controlled territory were not confirmed, and Kochiev clarified that they remain in pretrial detention.
On September 17, the State Security Service of Georgia released information regarding the illegal detention of two Georgian citizens in the occupied territory near Mejvriskhevi.
