Latest news with #BidzinaIvanishvili
BBC News
19 hours ago
- Politics
- BBC News
Georgia jails six political figures in one week in crackdown on opposition
Georgian opposition leader Nika Melia has become the latest opposition figure to be sent to jail this week in a crackdown described by observers as an unprecedented attack on the country's South Caucausus state has seen months of political turmoil since the government halted its path to join the EU in the wake of disputed prominent politicians have been given jail terms, and another two are in pre-trial detention, so that most of the leaders of the pro-Western opposition are now behind Friday, Nika Melia, one of the leaders of Coalition for Change, was jailed for eight months by a court in Tbilisi and former opposition MP Givi Targamadze was given seven months. The scale and speed of the crackdown has come as a shock, and Nika Melia accused the government of trying to break the courage of Georgians. All of the jailed politicians have been convicted of refusing to testify before a parliamentary commission and barred from holding public office for two years. In what it called "the most severe democratic collapse in Georgia's post-Soviet history", anti-corruption watchdog Transparency International said the governing Georgian Dream party, led by billionaire founder Bidzina Ivanishvili, had launched "a full-scale authoritarian offensive".In a matter of days, jail terms have also been handed down to four other opposition leaders: Giorgi Vashadze, Zurab Japaridze, Badri Japaridze and Mamuka Khazaradze. Another prominent opposition leader, Nika Gvaramia, is in pre-trial detention as well as a former defence minister."The Soviet Union has returned to our present and wants our minds to cling to the past," Nika Melia wrote on Facebook. Georgia regained its independence when the Soviet Union collapsed in said this week that the arrest of opposition leaders was an "unprecedented attack on Georgia's democracy" and it called for an end to "repressive actions". After last October's elections, the opposition accused Ivanishvili's party of stealing the vote. Opposition parties then boycotted parliament and, when the European Parliament denounced the election as neither free nor fair, the ruling party halted Georgia's bid to join the European have since protested in central Tbilisi every night for more than 200 nights, demanding new elections and the release of all prisoners arrested during pro-EU government then set up an investigative parliamentary commission into the "alleged crimes" of the previous government before Georgian Dream came to power in 2012, specifically the period covering Georgia's war with Russia in 2008. Failing to comply with a "lawful request" by a parliamentary commission is a criminal offence under Georgia's criminal code. Opposition politicians have refused to testify, partly because of their boycott of parliament, but also because they reject it as a politically motivated attack on government critics. Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze told parliament on Friday that the commission was doing very important work exposing a previous government that was "entirely built on crime"."Everyone must understand once and for all that there is no place for criminals in Georgian politics."Human rights groups say 500 people have been arrested during the recent street protests and that 300 of them were subjected to torture. As many as 60 people are being held as political prisoners, they journalist Mzia Amaglobeli remains imprisoned, and independent TV stations face censorship and financial ruin. Earlier this week 40 civil society groups said that Bidzina Ivanishvili had "chosen to maintain power through dictatorship, and fundamental human rights are violated every day".Ivanishvili, who is under US sanctions, accumulated his wealth in Russia during the 1990s. He formally retired from politics but is widely believed to have control over all branches of month, a former confidant of Ivanishvili who went on the run said he was "kidnapped from abroad" and flown back to Georgia by force as a political Bachiashvili had been on trial in Georgia accused of misappropriating millions of dollars in a case he said was politically authorities say Bachiashvili, 39, was convicted of a crime while in absentia and will serve his jail lawyer, Robert Amsterdam, told the BBC he was deeply concerned for his safety: "Too many people see him as a highly competent political figure."
Reuters
16-06-2025
- Business
- Reuters
Georgia's Ivanishvili asks UK court to uphold $607 mln ruling against Credit Suisse
LONDON, June 16 (Reuters) - Georgia's former prime minister Bidzina Ivanishvili on Monday urged a London court to uphold a $607 million Bermudan judgment he won against a Credit Suisse subsidiary over a long-running fraud committed by a former Credit Suisse adviser. Ivanishvili, the founder of the ruling Georgian Dream party who is widely seen as the country's de facto leader, sued the Swiss bank's local life insurance arm in Bermuda to try and recoup losses caused by late banker Patrice Lescaudron. Lescaudron, an adviser at Credit Suisse Trust in Singapore, was convicted by a Swiss court in 2018 of forging signatures of former clients, including Ivanishvili, and admitted falsifying trades and hiding losses. He killed himself in 2020. Ivanishvili and his family successfully sued Bermuda-based Credit Suisse Life and were awarded $607 million in damages by a Bermudan court, which was upheld on appeal in 2023. But Credit Suisse – now owned by rival UBS (UBSG.S), opens new tab – is challenging the ruling at London's Privy Council, the final court of appeal for Bermuda and some other Commonwealth states. Charles Falconer, a lawyer representing CS Life, said in court filings that the Bermudan courts misunderstood its contract with Ivanishvili, meaning the unit was "wrongly held liable for (Credit Suisse AG) failure to manage the assets". CS Life also referred to Ivanishvili being sanctioned by the U.S., opens new tab in December for undermining democracy for Russia's benefit, raising the question of whether Ivanishvili could be paid. Ivanishvili's lawyers, however, say it would have made no sense for him to have transferred over $750 million from Credit Suisse into two life insurance policies with CS Life, but without CS Life having any contractual obligations to him. Ivanishvili has separate litigation against Credit Suisse in Singapore, where he was awarded $926 million, though that sum will be reduced by recoveries and to prevent double recovery.
Free Malaysia Today
05-06-2025
- Business
- Free Malaysia Today
Georgia to shutter EU and Nato information centre as ties with West fray
Ex-prime minister Bidzina Ivanishvili has said the EU and Nato are controlled by a shadowy 'global war party' that seeks to topple Georgia's government. (EPA Images pic) TBILISI : The Georgian government is to close its information centre on Nato and the EU, Georgian media reported today, citing the country's foreign ministry, amid souring ties between Tbilisi and the West. According to its website, the information centre aims 'to engage our population in Georgia's European and Euro-Atlantic integration processes and to gain their well-informed support'. The centre, opened in 2005, is based in a large building on Freedom Square in downtown Tbilisi and flies the flags of the EU, the Nato military alliance and Georgia. Georgia's Interpress news agency reported that the centre is to be merged into the foreign ministry and that some staff have been told they are to be dismissed. The ministry did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Georgia has been an EU candidate member since 2023, while Nato said in 2008 that the mountainous country of 3.6 million would eventually join the alliance. But though once among the most pro-Western and democratic of the Soviet Union's successor states, Georgia's government has in recent years moved to clamp down on domestic critics, while also rebuilding ties with former imperial overlord, Russia. Bidzina Ivanishvili, a billionaire ex-prime minister widely seen as Georgia's de facto leader, has said the EU and Nato are controlled by a shadowy 'global war party' that seeks to topple the government and drag his country into war with Russia. Ivanishvili's Georgian Dream party in November 2024 paused EU accession talks until 2028, abruptly halting a popular national goal that is written into the country's constitution. The EU has said Tbilisi's application has been frozen over laws on 'foreign agents' and LGBT rights that Brussels has criticised as restrictive and influenced by Russian policies . Georgian Dream says it still wants to eventually join the EU and Nato, but that it also wants to keep the peace with its huge northern neighbour, as well as preserve the country's traditional Christian values. The US imposed sanctions on Ivanishvili last December, accusing him of dismantling Georgian democracy in the interests of Russia. Tbilisi and Moscow have had no formal diplomatic ties since 2008, when Russia defeated Georgia in a brief war over two Moscow-backed separatist regions.
Reuters
04-06-2025
- Business
- Reuters
Georgia to shutter EU and NATO information centre as ties with West fray
TBILISI, June 4 (Reuters) - The Georgian government is to close its information centre on NATO and the European Union, Georgian media reported on Wednesday, citing the country's foreign ministry, amid souring ties between Tbilisi and the West. According to its website, the information centre aims "to engage our population in Georgia's European and Euro-Atlantic integration processes and to gain their well-informed support". The centre, opened in 2005, is based in a large building on Freedom Square in downtown Tbilisi and flies the flags of the EU, the NATO military alliance and Georgia. Georgia's Interpress news agency reported that the centre is to be merged into the foreign ministry and that some staff have been told they are to be dismissed. The ministry did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Georgia has been an EU candidate member since 2023, while NATO said in 2008 that the mountainous country of 3.6 million would eventually join the alliance. But though once among the most pro-Western and democratic of the Soviet Union's successor states, Georgia's government has in recent years moved to clamp down on domestic critics, while also rebuilding ties with former imperial overlord, Russia. Bidzina Ivanishvili, a billionaire ex-prime minister widely seen as Georgia's de facto leader, has said the EU and NATO are controlled by a shadowy "global war party" that seeks to topple the government and drag his country into war with Russia. Ivanishvili's Georgian Dream party in November 2024 paused EU accession talks until 2028, abruptly halting a popular national goal that is written into the country's constitution. The EU has said Tbilisi's application has been frozen over laws on "foreign agents" and LGBT rights that Brussels has criticised as restrictive and influenced by Russian policies . Georgian Dream says it still wants to eventually join the EU and NATO, but that it also wants to keep the peace with its huge northern neighbour, as well as preserve the country's traditional Christian values. The United States imposed sanctions on Ivanishvili last December, accusing him of dismantling Georgian democracy in the interests of Russia. Tbilisi and Moscow have had no formal diplomatic ties since 2008, when Russia defeated Georgia in a brief war over two Moscow-backed separatist regions.
BBC News
29-05-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Ex-aide of Georgia's most powerful man, claims he was abducted abroad
A former confidant of Georgia's most powerful man has alleged in a Tbilisi court that he was "kidnapped from abroad" last Saturday and flown back to Georgia by Bachiashvili, 39, who once headed the Co-Investment Fund for Georgia's de facto ruler, billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili, accused officials of resorting to "banditry" and acting on Ivanishvili's direct told a Tbilisi court he was blindfolded for two days and then flown back "in complete violation of the law", without access to his lawyers and authorities say he was detained near a border crossing and Prime Minister Irakli Kobakhidze said he should be happy he was safely in Georgia. Ivanishvili's Georgian Dream party has been in power for 13 years, although the opposition considers the government and parliament "illegitimate", citing widespread allegations of election fraud last October."Today I am Ivanishvili's personal prisoner," declared Bachiashvili in court on Thursday. He is due to return to court on 9 went on the run in early March, when he fled Georgia midway through a trial that later saw him sentenced in absentia to 11 years in prison for embezzlement, which he has vehemently had been accused of misappropriating $42.7m from a Bitcoin investment deal, a case he said was politically motivated and led by Ivanishvili. Although he did not say where he had been at the time of his alleged abduction on Saturday, a close friend said on condition of anonymity that Bachiashvili had been at a hotel in Abu Dhabi when three vehicles arrived, and he was seized."He gets extradited with no lawyer, no trial, absolutely nothing," the friend told the BBC. The BBC has approached the authorities in UAE for a response to the businessman also alleged that he had been forcibly returned on a Bombardier aircraft run by Airzena, the former name of privately owned Georgian Airways. In a statement, the airline said it was impossible for anyone to "board or depart from any international airport on any airline illegally".Whatever the circumstances surrounding his return to Georgia, the State Security Service announced he had been arrested on Monday after an anonymous tip-off near the Red Bridge border crossing with crossing has been shut by Azerbaijan since the 2020 coronavirus lawyer Robert Amsterdam said this week that his client was at risk of "arbitrary detention, coercive interrogation, and abusive mistreatment".The head of Georgia's state security service, Anri Okhanashvili, said Bachiashvili had been convicted of a crime and would serve his sentence, adding that not a single hair had fallen from his head, Interpressnews agency prime minister said the businessman appeared to believe that his life was in danger. If that was the case then he should be happy he was back "in Georgia, in a safe place... in appropriate conditions". The allegations coincide with the departure of another close aide of Georgia's most powerful interior minister Vahtang Gomelauri resigned on Wednesday without giving a reason, other than to spend more time with his has in the past acted as a personal bodyguard for Bidzina Ivanishvili and he has been placed under economic sanctions from the US, the UK and several EU countries for his alleged role in violent suppression of anti-government whose estimated wealth is $4.9bn (£3.9bn), made his fortune in Russia in the 1990s in computing, metals and hero or Russian ally? The billionaire dividing GeorgiansHunger-striking journalist challenges Georgia's government from jailHe established a political party in Georgia in 2011 and won elections the following told the Guardian he had served as Ivanishvili's "right-hand man" for over a decade, managing the oligarch's vast financial empire and acting as deputy chief executive of Georgia's sovereign wealth described playing a crucial role in recovering hundreds of millions of dollars stolen from Ivanishvili by a rogue Credit Suisse adviser, successfully leading complex legal battles across multiple according to Bachiashvili, their relationship soured after Russia's invasion of Ukraine in added that Ivanishvili had operated like "a sultan and his servants" with prime ministers, judges and prosecutors, who had all made pilgrimages to his hilltop residence in the capital case mirrors that of another fallen Georgian Dream ally, businessman Giorgi Chikvaidze, who was sentenced to nine years in prison on embezzlement charges in recent weeks after publicly turning against the ruling party and claiming to possess evidence of government ties to Russian intelligence."Everyone will be held accountable sooner or later," Bachiashvili said in the dock on Thursday, promising to reveal "all the details" of what he called an international crime committed on his former boss's direct reporting by Paul Kirby and Nino Shonia.
