Ruling party officials still requesting evidence for US sanctioning of ex-official despite Ambassador’s indication

The ruling Georgian Dream party officials on Wednesday still pointed to the need of evidence behind the US-sanctioning of former Prosecutor General Otar Partkhaladze in September, despite the country’s Ambassador’s explanation that Governments would see the sanctions as an “indication” to look into specific cases. 

 

Mamuka Mdinaradze, the ruling Georgian Dream party MP, said Tbilisi opened an investigation into Partskhaladze’s case for his alleged cooperation with Russian FSB “only based on the US claims with zero evidence”, pointing to the “respect and authority” of the partner state. 
“No one, from any part of the world, has provided no evidence backing the allegations so far”, he said. 

 

In her interview for Radio Liberty this week, Robin Dunnigan, the US Ambassador to Georgia, said “some of them [the sanctions] are aimed at promoting accountability, fighting corruption. The purpose of sanctions against Russia is to stop actions in favor of Russia, as well as to stop the promotion of the Russian war machine, which Russia uses not only to carry out aggression in Ukraine, but also elsewhere. “So, when we apply sanctions, we expect countries not only to protect them, but when these people are citizens of individual countries, this is useful information for governments to investigate possible cases of corruption by them, or, in the case of Partskhaladze, a case of possible very close interaction with FSB. We would advise governments in all cases to use our sanctions as a kind of indication that they can investigate,” said the Ambassador. 

 

In his comments last month, Grigol Liluashvili, the head of the State Security Service, whose office is looking into the case, also said the US had provided “no evidence” in the case, and that Partskhaladze had already left the country.