Georgian police attaché blacklisted in EU gets down to work in Belarus

September 11, Pozirk. Georgian police attaché Davit Atabegashvili, a former police official blacklisted by the Baltic states for his alleged role in the arrest and imprisonment of an independent Georgian journalist, has assumed his duties in Minsk, with the Belarusian interior ministry reporting that he would coordinate cooperation with Belarusian law-enforcement agencies.

On September 11, Georgian Ambassador Giorgi Saganelidze introduced Atabegashvili to Belarusian Interior Minister Ivan Kubrakoŭ, the ministry said.

Kubrakoŭ “expressed confidence that the meeting would give a new impetus to relations between the law enforcement bodies of the two states.” He revealed that a person “wanted for committing drug related crimes” was deported from Georgia to Belarus earlier on Friday. 

Kubrakoŭ reportedly boasted about Belarus’ experience fighting “extremism and terrorism” – the term authorities use to describe any dissent – and expressed readiness to share this expertise with Georgian counterparts.

On September 2, Belarus’ Prosecutor General Dźmitryj Hara met with the Georgian ambassador in Minsk to discuss the extradition of “criminals.”

Georgia, a visa-free country for Belarusians, is home to about 12,000 citizens of Belarus, many of whom fled their country for fear of politically-motivated persecution after the 2020 presidential election. Amid the crackdown on post-election protests, authorities in Belarus have equated criticism, solidarity, advocacy, the free media and free expression with extremism and terrorism.

Batumelebi reported on the new appointment of Davit Atabegashvili, former deputy head of the internal affairs directorate in Georgia’s southwestern region of Adjara, as far back as April 2025.

According to the website, Atabegashvili was “particularly aggressive” toward pro-European protesters in Batumi.

He reportedly ordered the arrest of journalist Mzia Amaglobeli during a protest rally on January 11, 2025 and hold her handcuffed at a police department for two hours.

Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia imposed sanctions on Atabegashvili for persecuting Amaglobeli.

Amaglobeli, co-founder of Georgia’s independent media outlets Netgazeti and Batumelebi, was arrested at a rally of protest against the ruling Georgian Dream rejecting integration with the European Union and embracing authoritarianism. She was accused of attacking a police officer and sentenced to two years in prison last July.

In protest, the journalist held a 38-day hunger strike.

The Belarusian Association of Journalists joined a demand for her release, initiated by the International Press Institute and signed by 90 human rights organizations, including journalistic ones, as well as 225 journalists, editors and publishers.

In December 2025, the European Parliament granted the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought to Mzia Amaglobeli as well as Belarusian journalist and prominent Polish minority activist Andrej Pačobut (Andrzej Poczobut), who was serving a prison sentence at the time.

Politics Security

Politics, Security

Belarus’ prosecutor general discusses extradition of “criminals” with Georgian ambassador

September 2, Pozirk. Belarus’ Prosecutor General Dźmitryj Hara met with Georgian Ambassador Giorgi Saganelidze in Minsk on Wednesday to discuss the extradition of criminals, according to the Prosecutor General’s Office. Hara and Saganelidze discussed cooperation “in the area of criminal …

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