ARCHIVE – Members of an election commission prepare to count the ballots at a polling station in Tbilisi after the parliamentary elections in Georgia. Photo: Kostya Manenkov/AP/dpa
Keystone
The public prosecutor’s office has opened an investigation into alleged vote rigging in the parliamentary elections in the South Caucasus republic of Georgia. The authority will examine the accusations made by President Salome Zurabishvili, politicians and observers, Georgian media reported.
Zurabishvili was summoned for questioning on Thursday and must have evidence of possible falsification, it was reported, citing a statement from the public prosecutor’s office. The day after the election, the president criticized the results of the ballot as being completely falsified. Investigations into individual violations on election day and before are already underway. The Central Election Commission had asked the public prosecutor’s office to investigate.
In a reaction to the announcement by the public prosecutor’s office that it wanted to question President Zurabishvili, politicians from the pro-European opposition repeated their accusations of election manipulation and in some cases stated that they distrusted the public prosecutor’s investigation.
Georgia elected a new parliament on Saturday. The election administration declared the ruling Georgian Dream party the winner. The pro-European opposition and the president consider the result to be falsified. Georgian and international observers reported numerous violations during the election. Most recently, US President Joe Biden also called for a transparent investigation into the irregularities in the election.
SDA