[1] According to the Georgian Interior Ministry, under the cover of its guerrilla warfare, the Forest Brothers engaged in kidnappings, smuggling and other crimes.
[4] The Forest Brothers were led by Dato Shengelia,[2] who disbanded the group after Mikheil Saakashvili was elected President of Georgia in January 2004.
On 11 February, Shengelia declared that he had reached an agreement with Interior Minister Giorgi Baramidze to lay down his arms.
[4] In December 2006, Shengalia was arrested for the possession of heroin and methadone,[4] and was convicted to 24 years of imprisonment.
On 22 February 2011, the Abkhazian delegation at the 25th meeting on incident prevention in Chuburkhinji questioned his release and demanded his extradition from the Georgian side for various serious crimes.