adminThe demonstrations erupted in the capital Tbilisi on Tuesday night after footage of the torture was shown on pro-opposition television channels. Thousands of people joined the protests on Wednesday, blocking two main streets and calling for the resignation of senior ministers.
The government said the video had been staged and recorded by guards who had been bribed by “politically motivated persons”.
The prosecutor’s office said 10 people had been arrested including the head of the prison in Tbilisi, two deputies and a number of guards. The prisons minister said she was resigning.
“Tonight, I tell all the victims of these inhuman actions and the whole nation that the Georgia we have built and we are all building together shall not and will not tolerate such behaviour — in its prisons or anywhere else,” Saakashvili said in a statement issued in the early hours of Wednesday.
“Those who committed these crimes will spend long years in jail, as will those who bribed guards to stage these horrors and film them,” he said.
Later Saakashvili said radical reforms should be enacted in the former Soviet republic’s penitentiary system and ordered patrol policemen to take on prison duties while reforms were worked out. — Al Jazeera
Online Reporter