Court Sentences Businessmen Opposed to Ivanishvili to 9 and 8 Years in Prison

Giorgi Chikvaidze was once a close associate and active supporter of the ruling Georgian Dream party, successfully operating a yacht business in Georgia. However, his relationship with the Georgian Dream deteriorated soon after he refused to carry out an “anti-state” directive. This involved the transfer of a yacht owned by Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, sanctioned by the West and a facilitator of Putin’s regime, from Turkey to Russia, via Georgian waters and under a Georgian flag.

Chikvaidze accuses Ivanishvili of involvement in another unusual and scandalous incident. He claims that, several years ago, he acted on instructions from the Georgian State Security Service, he purchased a yacht in Montenegro for a Russian intelligence officer and his wife, with whom Chikvaidze alleges Ivanishvili has close ties. According to Chikvaidze, he also, under State Security Service orders, delivered a substance for shamanic-magical rituals to this couple in Montenegro, which reportedly violated Georgian border crossing regulations and customs procedures.

The Prosecutor’s Office charged Chikvaidze and Papiashvili with the unlawful embezzlement of large sums of money through a prior group agreement, using their official positions. The investigation was initiated based on a complaint from ELT Building, alleging embezzlement of a significant amount of money belonging to the firm.

Chikvaidze and Papiashvili were supposed to deliver an Italian-made "Azimut Atlantis 45 2023" yacht to LTD ELT Building, for which ELT Building paid them €416,700. The deadline for delivering the yacht was August 31, 2023. Chikvaidze’s LTD Ramses Georgian Yachting Platform couldn’t deliver the yacht on time due to a storm at sea, the breakdown of the yacht's engine, and the inability to replace it, according to Chikvaidze. The parties amended the contract several times, setting the final delivery deadline for January 15, 2024.

According to Giorgi Chikvaidze, as early as November 2023, he and Irakli Papiashvili decided to repay ELT Building the amount paid for the yacht. in December 2023, Papiashvili transferred €50,000 to the ELT Building. Giorgi Chikvaidze stated that he would fully pay the debt if criminal prosecution were not initiated against him and Papiashvili. He assessed this situation as political retaliation.

Chikvaidze further stated that Elguja Turmanidze had threatened him, saying that his relative,  Vladimer Turmanidze, held a senior position in the Adjara Prosecutor’s Office and that through him, Chikvaidze would be “destroyed,” since this civil-type case would be “elegantly turned into a criminal one.”

For context, this is the same Vladimer Turmanidze who came into public attention as the prosecutor in the case of Mzia Amaghlobeli, founder of Netgazati and Batumelebi, and for which Estonia and Lithuania sanctioned him.

Transparency International Georgia, which examined Giorgi Chikvaidze's criminal case, assessed that the case is essentially of a civil nature, and the issue of his liability should have been addressed within the framework of a civil dispute, according to civil procedural legislation.

“The activation of criminal prosecution mechanisms against Giorgi Chikvaidze and his business partner constitutes an abuse of process and the entire law enforcement/judiciary system. The motive behind the abuse of criminal process is most likely twofold: On one hand, it highlights the corrupt-nepotistic interests of the opposing side, and on the other hand, it reflects the regime's interest in settling accounts with a former business supporter who dared to refuse to fulfill anti-state tasks and later began speaking publicly about it,” states Transparency International Georgia.