21:27, 26 October 2006

Georgian citizens-deportees from the Russian Federation cannot get home

About 100 deported citizens of Georgia still remain at the Dagestan section of the Georgian-Russian border and cannot get to their homeland. The fact was presented by Elena Tevdoradze, chairperson of the parliamentary human rights committee, at the sitting of the Georgian Parliament on October 26.

"Frontier guards believe that something wrong is with their passports," Tevdoradze stated. In her words, "the people have spent several nights in the weather waiting for a permit to cross the border".

Tevdoradze asked the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Frontier Police of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Georgia of to take all the necessary measures to enable the Georgian citizens deported from Russia make a safe return to their homeland.

We remind you that deportation of Georgians from Russia was a consequence of an espionage scandal. Georgian officials accuse their Russian counterparts of ethnic cleansings and even of genocide in relation to Georgian natives.