Georgian Dream MP Irakli Zarkua has been seen with his arms around an unidentified woman in a video showcasing Monaco’s nightlife. The politician, who is married with two children, dismissed the video as ‘false information’, suggesting it was AI-generated.
The video featuring Zarkua was published on 12 January by the Facebook page Carspotter Daily Monaco under the title ‘Monaco nightlife’. The page frequently posts similar content, showing people strolling through the wealthy districts of the city-state.
During the video, Zarkua was apparently caught on camera wearing a white shirt, alongside a woman dressed in a light blue, sleeveless dress. The original date of the video’s creation is unknown.
The video’s circulation on Georgian social media was met with ridicule toward Zarkua, with some suggesting that he may have been cheating on his wife. Others highlighted the lavish lifestyles and luxury European trips of ruling party officials against the backdrop of social hardship in Georgia and Georgian Dream’s criticism of the EU for forgoing ‘traditional values’.
On the night of 12 January, the MP himself responded to the video on social media, accusing his opponents — whom he referred to using several derogatory terms — of spreading ‘another false information’ about him.
‘They’re trying, sometimes using artificial intelligence, sometimes Photoshop, to post all kinds of crazy photos and videos about me to run a smear campaign’, he wrote.
‘Here I am, in Tbilisi. Tbilisi! Or even if I were in Europe, strolling around, would I need to ask for permission from Natsi trolls and Akatsuki?’ Zarkua continued, using pejorative terms frequently employed by the ruling party against opponents, with ‘Natsi’ referring to the formerly ruling United National Movement (UNM) party.
Zarkua’s reaction drew even more mockery on social media, with some comparing it to a scene from a popular Georgian sitcom in which a man insists to his female partner that a photo of him with another woman online was digitally altered. In another widely seen video, a clip from Monaco was combined with an old interview of Zarkua, in which he spoke about the importance of family values while criticising the EU.
By 13 January, the video was no longer available on the Carspotter Daily Monaco page. The circumstances of its removal from the public space remain unclear. On the same day, Zarkua responded ironically to journalists who approached him for a comment near the parliament saying:
‘I’m in Monaco and, unfortunately, I cannot provide a comment’.
Zarkua became a Georgian Dream MP in 2020 and is frequently featured in the media, including for his confrontational comments toward critics of the government, both inside and outside Georgia.
Zarkua also made headlines around this time last year, when he and other ruling party MPs attacked Georgian national Lasha Gabitashvili at a hotel in Abu Dhabi. The chaotic physical altercation occurred a day after Gabitashvili had confronted the MPs about their party’s policies at the same hotel.
Upon returning to Georgia, Gabitashvili reported being attacked again, that time on one of the streets of Tbilisi, by three masked individuals. Gabitashvili has said the attack was a continuation of the incident in Abu Dhabi.
Zarkua has denied any involvement in the attack.
Mikheil Gvadzabia
