Tbilisi, September 5 (AVN) - The 13 Russian citizens brought on trial in Tbilisi pleaded innocent to the charge of involvement in illegal armed formations on Wednesday.
The defendants were detained by Georgian border guards in the Svanetian mountains in summer this year. Their group was blocked 10km from the Kabardino-Balkarian strap of the Georgia-Russia border on June 6. It was armed but did not put up resistance during the detention. On the eve of the incident Russian law-enforcement agencies carried out a search operation in the Kabardino-Balkarian autonomous republic that aimed to detain a large group of rebels forming part of warlord Ruslan Gelayev's detachment.
The detainees continue to insist that they were nothing more than tourists and that they entered Georgia because of losing their way.
The charges were pressed by the Georgian State Security Ministry. The prosecutor who spoke in court filed a petition to prolong the preliminary detention term for another month for the entire group. The prolongation is needed "in the interests of the investigation," he claimed. The court agreed to the petition.
The Russian prosecutor general's office demands extradition of the group but the Georgian party has made no decision on the matter.