Zinovkina told the court about surveillance and threats of rape
Anastasia Zinovkina, charged in Georgia in a drug case, told the court that she noticed she was being followed after participating in protests. She also said that one of the security officers threatened to rape her after her arrest.
As reported by "Kavkazsky Uzel", Russian citizens Artem Gribul and Anastasia Zinovkina, who participated in protests in Tbilisi, were arrested on charges of drug trafficking. They claim that evidence was planted on them, and that the security officers resorted to threats. At a hearing in April, during the interrogation of a police officer, Gribul held a piece of paper with the inscription: "He planted drugs in my pockets." Zinovkina suffers from problems with her spine and vision, but does not receive medical care. Georgian border guards refused to let Anastasia's mother into the country, the woman filed a complaint.
According to security officials, packages of narcotics were found in the apartment. Gribul's father previously told the "Caucasian Knot" that the case includes a video recording of the search, and the operative appears and then disappears from the frame. "There is a moment when operatives are recorded standing at the door, but the investigator disappears from the frame for four minutes. In four minutes, you can do anything, plant any evidence," he said.
At a court hearing in Tbilisi on August 14, Anastasia Zinovkina spoke about the reasons for coming to Tbilisi in October 2024. According to the prisoner, she and her boyfriend Artem Gribul came to Georgia from Armenia for a short time, planning to then move to South America. “We have already bought tickets from Tbilisi to Brazil,” Publika quotes her as saying.
Although Zinovkina and Gribul took part in pro-European rallies in December, they did not plan to stay in Georgia for long. “Artem and I really like Georgia, but I don’t want to live under a dictatorship… (...) I have lived my whole life under a dictatorship and have never seen another life,” she said.
According to Zinovkina, about a week and a half before her arrest, she noticed that she was being followed: the same people were watching her from cars near her home and at the bank where she went to withdraw money to pay her rent.
Anastasia also stated in court that one of the police officers who detained her threatened to rape her. “Irakli Mukhatgverdeli threatened to rape me. At the same time, they took off my outerwear. His actions were not only verbal. He started to grope me so that his threat would be tangible… He started to touch the buckle of my pants, saying: “I will punish you.” After I saw that drugs had been planted on me, everyone calmed down. Everyone started to speak more quietly, except for Irakli Mukhatgverdeli, he touched me and threatened me,” Pirveli TV company quotes her as saying.
One of the Georgian political prisoners, Revaz Kiknadze, accused of violence at protests, spoke out on August 14 in support of Zinovkina, Gribul, and Russian citizen Anton Chechin, who was arrested in a similar drug case. He suggested that they were being prepared to be “sacrificed” because the public was indifferent to the persecution of foreigners.
“Everyone knows my attitude towards Russians and everything Russian (...) A dictatorship is a dictatorship everywhere, and those who fight it are equally valued everywhere. What is the point of my fight if someone is unfairly sacrificed, even a citizen of another country? Justice should be the same for everyone. And these people fought there as best they could, fought against the Putin regime. Many of their compatriots, unfortunately, are here, and they don’t care what happens. And they came every night and helped the poisoned (gassed) demonstrators as best they could. In my opinion, they are no worse than the rest,” NEWS.On.ge quotes Kiknadze’s letter from prison.
“Caucasian Knot” published a report “The Main Thing About the Persecution of Protesters in Georgia”. The Caucasian Knot collected materials about the parliamentary elections and the protests that followed them on the page "Elections in Georgia-2024".
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