Eight individuals had been arrested and two declared wanted for abuse of power, illegal detention and premeditated murder in a high-profile case of the 2008 death of Roin Shavadze, a Brigade Sergeant in the Georgian armed forces who had fought in the August war.

According to the Prosecutor General’s Office, it had conducted a “comprehensive investigation” into the case of the death of the servicemember who also served in the peacekeeping mission in Iraq between 2005-2006 and received awards for his service”.

“The inquiry was conducted following the European Court of Human Rights’ ruling in November 2020, which found claims by the United National Movement Government on his death having occurred following his attempt to flee lawful detention to have been inconsistent with evidence.

The new investigation had been supervised by the Council of Europe’s Committee of Ministers.

The inquiry had revealed Shavadze had been beaten and shot to death by employees of the Department of Constitutional Security on August 16, 2008, 2 days after his return from service in the 2008 war.

The investigation revealed the Head of the Department’s offices in Batumi - where Shavadze lived - had received instructions to for an operational study of details around the servicemember based on a supposed information on his cooperation with a special service of a foreign state.

Following the instructions, Shavadze was first beaten in a public café in Batumi by a group of employees of the body, receiving injuries threatening his life and causing him to fall unconscious, before being driven to a spot near the Kobuleti-Kakuti highway, where he was shot 40 times and killed.

The evidence uncovered during the investigation had proved the conclusions of the then-state authorities on the servicemember having been arrested with illegal drugs on him, and having taken a weapon from the arresting group before attempting an escape and shooting in the direction of the Department employees before being shot and killed, to have been used to create a fake version of the events leading to his death”, - says the agency.