Tbilisi, Georgia: Ex-president Mikheil Saakashvili said on Friday he had returned from exile to Georgia despite the threat of arrest and ahead of local elections in the Caucasus country gripped by a protracted political crisis. 'I risked my life and freedom to be back,' Saakashvili said in a video on Facebook, adding that he was in Georgia's western city of Batumi on the Black Sea coast. The 53-year-old flamboyant pro-Western reformer was Georgian president from 2004 to 2013 and swept to power in a wave of street protests. Saakashvili is wanted by Georgian authorities on abuse of office charges, which he said are politically motivated.