“Arresting journalists for exercising their right to freedom of speech is the hallmark of a cowardly government that is afraid of the people it is supposed to serve,” former U.S. Ambassador to Georgia Ian Kelly wrote on the social media platform X.

Ian Kelly was commenting on journalist Vakho Sanaia being sentenced to 14 days of administrative detention.

“Arresting journalists for exercising their right to freedom of speech is the hallmark of a cowardly government that is afraid of the people it is supposed to serve. Shameful,” Ian Kelly wrote on X.

As reported, Tbilisi City Court sentenced journalist Vakho Sanaia to 14 days of administrative detention over a social media post he wrote about Parliament Speaker Shalva Papuashvili and MP Vladimir Bozhadze.