Juansher Burchuladze on the detention of former defense agency employees and his wife’s brother: “I don’t think there’s any political interest or agenda here, or that it concerns me or the former Prime Minister. If my relatives were involved in something, they should be punished”
“I don’t think there’s any political interest or agenda here… I don’t feel any sense of artificiality,” said former Defense Minister Juansher Burchuladze regarding the detention of former employees of his agency and his relative by the State Security Service (SSS).
In an interview with “TV Pirveli,” Burchuladze stated that he met with former Prime Minister Irakli Gharibashvili and discussed the ongoing events.
“I am confident that the truth will ultimately come to light, and my colleagues’ guilt in this matter will not be established. I learned from the court proceedings and have information. Naturally, my family members attended the court. Here, if there’s any falsification, it could only be in the interest of a private company. I can’t theoretically imagine why it would be in the agency’s interest for a private company to falsify documents. As for my relative, as far as I know, they are implicated in facilitating falsification. In this case, too, I can’t imagine why it would be in my relative’s interest to facilitate document falsification. However, if they were involved in such a thing, naturally, they should be punished,” Burchuladze stated.
When asked whether he had been summoned for questioning by the investigative agency, Burchuladze responded:
“Generally, the investigation process is a ‘classified’ matter, and there’s confidentiality, so I’ll limit myself to that,” Burchuladze said.
To the question of whether he thinks the investigative agency is trying to target him or that he is the actual target, the former minister gave a negative response.
“I don’t think there’s any political interest or agenda here… I don’t feel that, and I repeat, I don’t sense any artificiality,” Burchuladze stated.
In his opinion, the ongoing events are not related to a fight against Irakli Gharibashvili.
“I don’t think this concerns me now or the former Prime Minister in any way,” Burchuladze said.
When asked whether he met with former Prime Minister Irakli Gharibashvili, Burchuladze confirmed that he “met him recently.”
“I had a consultation once; I met him recently, yes… Nothing, he was interested in what information I had regarding this issue,” Burchuladze stated.
