"It was a well planned riot and breakout attempt," Georgy Kavtaradze said. "According to our information, the breakout from pretrial detention center No. 5 was to be followed by similar attempts at other prisons."
According to earlier reports, at about 1 a.m. Moscow time, justice department officers searched prison cells and seized forbidden items in the facility in the capital, Tbilisi, but inmates put up fierce resistance. Extra police forces armed with special equipment were called in to deal with the riot.
"Police had to use force and open fire. As a result, two inmates were killed and two police officers were wounded," the minister said, adding that two guns had been discovered in a cell.
"The decision to use force was absolutely correct," the minister said. "Our colleagues in democratic European states would have done exactly the same [in this situation]. It was a well organized provocation."
He said the prison building had been almost completely destroyed, so prisoners were being moved to facilities in other parts of the country.
However, contrary to official reports, prisoners' relatives, who were outside the prison building throughout the night, told journalists that six inmates had been killed and 13 wounded as a result of the police operation.
