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France to make asylum decision on Georgian opposition leader

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France will decide whether to grant political asylum to Georgia's ex-defense minister and opposition leader, Irakly Okruashvili, before January 3, the acting head of his party said on Wednesday.
TBILISI, December 26 (RIA Novosti) - France will decide whether to grant political asylum to Georgia's ex-defense minister and opposition leader, Irakly Okruashvili, before January 3, the acting head of his party said on Wednesday.

"After Okruashvili approached Germany's migration service for political asylum, German authorities sent his documents to France, where he had been issued with a Schengen visa," said Georgy Tortladze, who heads the Movement for United Georgia.

Okruashvili, once a key ally of the U.S.-educated former president Mikheil Saakashvili, is currently in German jail pending a decision on his extradition, requested by the Georgian government that said he had failed to show up for a court trial over corruption charges.

He had made a political asylum application with German authorities just days before he was arrested in Berlin in late November, his lawyer said at the time.

Okruashvili was initially arrested in Georgia in September after publicly accusing Saakashvili of ordering the murders of political opponents and of plotting to seize a breakaway region. He was released soon after on $6 million bail and left the Caucasus state.

Okruashvili's arrest sparked mass street protests in the capital, Tbilisi, which were eventually brutally broken up by police. Saakashvili announced early elections for January 5 and subsequently stepped down to run for reelection.

"Under an agreement between the countries within the [visa-free] Schengen zone, political asylum is granted by the country that issued a visa," Tortladze said.

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