"Saakashvili is perceived in the West as the man who modernized Georgia" | Exclusive interview with Radosław Sikorski

"Saakashvili is perceived in the West as the man who modernized Georgia," former Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski said in an exclusive interview with the Mtavari Channel.

These vendettas against former governments and presidents are always risky. If you are really going to arrest a previous ruler, you have to have really strong evidence and proof. If you don't have it, it's very much like political revenge. There was also a case against Petro Poroshenko, but the war ended it and now the former president of Ukraine is perceived more as a patriot than as a criminal.

I personally told the Georgian authorities that they should not forget one fact: Saakashvili is perceived in the West as the man who modernized Georgia. He gathered a group of reformers and changed Georgia for the better. So now the Georgian government has to be very careful when it comes to this," Sikorski says.