Georgian Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili commented on a new open letter from former Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili, published on September 1. This letter marks the former prime minister's fourth message from prison.

In his new letter, Garibashvili criticized current Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze and Mamuka Mdinaradze, who recently announced his retirement from politics. He also raised the circumstances of the death of former human rights activist Lazar Jorbenadze, who committed suicide.

Commenting on the letter, Papuashvili stated that issues related to the charges brought against Garibashvili by the prosecutor's office should not be politicized.

"We have seen attempts to politicize such issues at various times before, but they have not produced any results. There are legal issues, and there are charges brought by the prosecutor's office. "This accusation must be answered. I believe everything else—political insinuations—is unnecessary," he concluded.

The Speaker of Parliament particularly criticized Garibashvili's reference to the circumstances of Jorbenadze's death. Papuashvili stated that he would not wish "personal tragedies to be used for political insinuations" on anyone.

"We know who resorts to such methods, and for years we have become accustomed to various tragedies being exploited, be it suicide or otherwise," he added.

According to Papuashvili, "at least respect should be shown for the soul" of a person who committed suicide.

Meanwhile, the former prime minister was visited in prison by Georgian Public Defender Levan Ioseliani. The reason for the visit was reports from Garibashvili's lawyer that a planned visit with his children had been canceled. Ioseliani said he discussed the matter with both the former prime minister himself and the prison administration.

"Naturally, we also touched on the reason for my visit—the cancellation of the visit. You know that this visit was incentive in nature, and, according to Mr. Irakli, it was canceled," Ioseliani said after meeting with Garibashvili.

According to the ombudsman, the prison administration explained the cancellation by citing renovation work and stated that they had no plans to change the existing procedure for granting Garibashvili visits.

"He was periodically entitled to incentive visits, and this incident, they claim, is related to infrastructure issues: renovations were underway at the time, which is why the visit could not be scheduled. At the same time, the prison administration has not stated any refusal or prohibition on granting him similar visits in the future," Ioseliani explained.

Garibashvili's lawyer, Lili Gelashvili, previously stated that the cancellation of a planned visit with his children should be considered a violation of the prisoner's rights. The Special Penitentiary Service later reported that the former prime minister had already exhausted his annual limit of long-term visits and his monthly limit of short-term visits.