Rally in support of Mukhtarli in Tbilisi on 31 May (OC Media)
Georgia’s Interior Minister has suspended the head of the Border Police and chief of Counterintelligence, in its investigation into the abduction of Azerbaijani journalist Afgan Mukhtarli from Tbilisi.
In a 20 July special briefing, Interior Minister Giorgi Mghebrisvhili claimed he was confident in the pair’s innocence, but that they will remain suspended until the investigation is concluded.
‘In any case, the border was crossed in uncertain conditions’, he added, asserting that the officials were suspended to ‘exclude any questions in the case’.
The minister did not specify how Mukhtarli crossed the border. According to him, police have interviewed 343 people but could not confirm the journalist’s claims.
Footage from more than 60 cameras have also been examined, according to Mghebrishvili, but none of them show that Mukhtarli was abducted.
He claimed footage from Baratashvili Street shows Mukhtarli catching a bus, but no one on the bus route claims to have seen ‘anything unusual’.
The case was forwarded to Georgia’s General Prosecutor’s Office on 20 July and an investigation is underway.
Mukhtarli’s lawyers and his wife claim that the journalist was abducted from Tbilisi by a group of unknown people wearing Georgian police uniforms. The claim has not been confirmed by the Georgian authorities, who have refused to release footage from security cameras along the route Mukhtarli took before the abduction.
Mukhtarli was last seen in Georgia by his friend on the evening of 29 May. After failing to return home, he resurfaced again in Azerbaijan charged with what his lawyer calls ‘bogus charges’.
The journalist is currently in pre-trial detention in Baku, charged with smuggling €10,000 ($11,200), border trespass, and disobeying border guards.
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has ruled that there was insufficient evidence to prove beyond doubt that the Georgian Government abducted investigative journalist Afgan Mukhtarli and handed him over to Azerbaijan.
Mukhtarli, a prominent journalist known for investigating official corruption in Azerbaijan, disappeared from the streets of Tbilisi on the night of 29 May 2017. He reappeared in Azerbaijani custody a day later and was charged with illegally crossing the border.
In it
The former deputy head of the State Security Service of Georgia (SSG), Ioseb (Soso) Gogashvili, has been sentenced to five years in prison on charges including abuse of power. Supporters of the former official claim the charges are politically motivated.
Tbilisi City Court announced the decision on Tuesday afternoon.
The court found Gogashvili guilty of all five charges, which included exceeding official powers, obtaining, storing, and disseminating personal data, and illegally purchasing a
In this week’s episode of the Caucasus Digest, Robin Fabbro talks to Ani Avetisyan and Ismi Aghayev about the latest accusations of war crimes levelled against Azerbaijan.
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OC Media co-director and journalist Mariam Nikuradze discusses the Georgian State Security Service
Azerbaijani journalist Afgan Mukhtarli has identified Giorgi Trapaidze, the head of Georgian counterintelligence, as being personally among his abductors.
Nodar Meladzis Shabati, an investigative show on TV channel Pirveli, broke the story on 1 October.
After showing Mukhtarli images of three officials from the State Security Service (SSG) possibly involved in his kidnapping, Mukhtarli recognised Trapaidze as the driver of the car by which he was taken from Tbilisi.
Mukhtarli, a prominent
Georgia’s Interior Minister has suspended the head of the Border Police and chief of Counterintelligence, in its investigation into the abduction of Azerbaijani journalist Afgan Mukhtarli from Tbilisi.
