Georgia releases Otkhozoria-Tatunashvili sanctions list

Georgia released the first 33 names on the ‘Otkho­zo­ria-Tatu­nashvili list’ of sanc­tioned indi­vid­u­als on Tuesday. The list includes those accused or convicted in absentia for ‘the murder, kid­nap­ping, torture, and inhumane treatment’ of Georgian citizens in Abkhazia and South Ossetia, and for the cover-up of these crimes, since 1991.

At its first meeting since par­lia­men­tary approval on 20 June, the cabinet led by new Prime Minister Mamuka Bakhtadze iden­ti­fied the justice and foreign min­istries — headed by Tea Tsu­lukiani and David Zal­ka­liani respec­tive­ly — as respon­si­ble for enforcing the decree and forwarded the draft to par­lia­ment

Following the sub­mis­sion of Otkho­zo­ria-Tatu­nashvili list 2 the Par­lia­ment, we will continue actively mobi­liz­ing Inter­na­tion­al Community in order to take appro­pri­ate measures against persons who have violated rights of #Georgian citizens in occupied Abkhazia & Tskhin­vali regions

— David Zal­ka­liani (@DZalkaliani) June 26, 2018

The list involves 24 cases related to Abkhazia and 9 to South Ossetia. It includes the head of the South Ossetian security services (KGB) in Akhalgori (Leningor), Alik Taboyev, and Akhal­o­gori Deputy Pros­e­cu­tor David Gurtsiyev, who are both accused of involve­ment in kid­nap­ping, torturing, and killing Archil Tatu­nashvili.

[Read more about Kandzhi-Ogly case on OC Media: Abkhazia releases border guard accused of killing Georgian man]

[Read more about Archil Tatu­nashvili autopsy results on OC Media: Georgian autopsy says Tatu­nashvili sustained over 100 injuries before dying]

On 26 June, South Ossetia’s pres­i­den­tial envoy for post-conflict set­tle­ment, Murat Dzhioyev, reit­er­at­ed the claim that Tatu­nashvili died of acute heart failure after attempt­ing to flee and sus­tain­ing injuries while trying to ‘grab a gun from a guard’.

Abkhazian border guard Rashid Kandzhi-Ogly, who was sentenced to 14 years impris­on­ment in absentia for killing Giga Otkho­zo­ria near the Georgian village of Khurcha in May 2016, was among six on the list who is wanted by Interpol, according to the res­o­lu­tion. The others are Otar Pala­vandzia and Oleg Papaskiri, impli­cat­ed in killing Abkhazia’s Council of Ministers chair Zhiuli Shartava in 1993, and Afrikan Bganba, Vakhtang Ubiria, and Vladimer Nachach-Ogly, for illegally restrict­ing the freedom and torturing Levan Mamasakhlisi in Gagra in 2011. Georgian author­i­ties said Ubiria was a security official in Abkhazia, and Nachach-Ogly the deputy chief pros­e­cu­tor.

Two women were included on the list — Tsibrona (Eka) Akhalaia, for allegedly heading an illegal armed unit, and Rosa Mirt­skhula­va, for com­mit­ting ethnic killings in the Gali (Gal) district of Abkhazia.

The gov­ern­ment said they would enforce ‘all possible sanctions’ regarding visas, property, and finances against those on the list.

Bakhtadze indicated that the list was ‘not exhaus­tive’, promising the next day it would ‘expand’ and that ‘all exe­cu­tion­ers will be punished’. The new Georgian cabinet submitted this list to par­lia­ment as a follow-up to a 21 March par­lia­men­tary res­o­lu­tion that had been initiated by the oppo­si­tion European Georgia in reaction to Tatunashvili’s killing.

Abkhazia’s Foreign Ministry condemned the list on Tuesday, calling the decree ‘baseless’, ‘extremely destruc­tive’, and ‘provoca­tive’. They said they held Bakhtadze per­son­al­ly respon­si­ble for the ‘potential destruc­tion of the only inter­na­tion­al structure for conflict res­o­lu­tion in the South Caucasus’, the Geneva dis­cus­sions.

The author­i­ties in Abkhazia had vowed to raise the issue at the Incident Pre­ven­tion and Response Mechanism (IPRM) meeting on Wednesday in Gali (Gal). After Georgia presented the issue of Otkhozoria’s murder, they claim that the Russian and Abkhazian par­tic­i­pants demanded it be dropped from the agenda, then walked out of the meeting.

‘Georgia’s Magnitsky Act’

MP Giorgi Kandelaki from the oppo­si­tion European Georgia crit­i­cised the lack of Russian citizens on the list. ‘What stopped the gov­ern­ment from including at least the chief of shift of the so-called border forces under whose super­vi­sion these two and other crimes have been committed?’, Kandelaki said to OC Media.

He claimed that a European Par­lia­ment res­o­lu­tion on 14 June which included an article calling for ‘Member states and the Council to blacklist and impose national and EU-wide sanctions on those who appear or who may appear on the Otkho­zo­ria-Tatu­nashvili list’ was thanks to European Georgia’s efforts.

European Georgia has also claimed that some of those on the list — Otar Turnanba, Raul Kortava, Vladimer Nachach-Ogly and Tsibrona (Eka) Akhalaia are dead. In a Facebook post, Kapanadze said this reflects ‘a negligent attitude from the Georgian gov­ern­ment’.

Speaking to Rustavi 2, MP Roman Got­siridze of the United National Movement said the sanctions should be expanded in the same way as America’s Magnitsky Act, going beyond their initial focus to include officials ‘like Abkhazia’s General Pros­e­cu­tor, Pros­e­cu­tor, and Gali Police Chief’.

The Magnitsky Act, enacted by the US in 2012, imposed travel and financial sanctions on the Russian officials respon­si­ble for the murder of Sergei Magnitsky in 2009. Magnitsky had been inves­ti­gat­ing tax fraud among high-ranking Russian officials when he was detained, per­se­cut­ed, and then refused medical treatment until his death in prison. The original act, which targeted just 18 Russian officials, was later used as a basis for the Global Magnitsky Act of 2016, which allows the US Gov­ern­ment to sanction crim­i­nal­ly guilty officials anywhere in the world. This latter leg­is­la­tion became the basis for similar laws in a number of other countries.

On 27 June, leaders from the ruling Georgian Dream Party said the list was not yet final. Par­lia­men­tary majority leader Archil Talak­vadze argued that the gov­ern­ment could not make any dec­la­ra­tions about those presumed dead without official proof.

For ease of reading, we choose not to use qual­i­fiers such as ‘de facto’, ‘unrecog­nised’, or ‘partially recog­nised’ when dis­cussing insti­tu­tions or political positions within Abkhazia, Nagorno-Karabakh, and South Ossetia. This does not imply a position on their status.