Lawyer: Torture consisted in coercing Irakli Garibashvili into confessing to a crime he did not commit prior to the start of the investigation — he excludes that Bidzina Ivanishvili is behind this

"We substantiate that the torture was expressed in the fact that Irakli Garibashvili was being coerced into confessing to a crime he had not committed, even before the start of the investigation," stated Soso Baratashvili, lawyer for former Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili, on PalitraNews' program Political Space.

According to the lawyer, if an investigation is launched, Irakli Garibashvili can demonstrate to the investigation how, in what manner, and from whom this originated.

As Baratashvili explained, the former Prime Minister excludes Bidzina Ivanishvili's involvement in organizing the said case against him.

"Regarding the statement we made concerning torture, let me explain what the torture consists of — Article 144 Prima of the Criminal Code of Georgia is torture, and torture encompasses not only physical impact by one person against another, but also mental and moral coercion aimed at obtaining a confession from said person. In this case, we substantiate that the torture was expressed in the fact that Irakli Garibashvili was being coerced into confessing to a crime he had not committed, even before the start of the investigation.

On August 17 of this year, Irakli Garibashvili issued a public statement that a letter was sent to him on the instructions of certain individuals asking him to plead guilty to a crime related to corruption and bribery, after which they offered that the sentence he was serving on the first case would absorb this sentence and that would be a relief for him.

It is clear from his statement that he refused to do so. It then turns out that on August 20 they interrogated Vasil Mkheidze, and on August 21 they interrogated former Minister of Defense Juansher Burchuladze. They then formulated charges of bribery against Irakli Garibashvili. Not a single new witness, not a single new piece of written evidence, and nothing else has been included in this case.

Irakli Garibashvili states that if an investigation is launched, he can substantiate before the investigation how, in what way, and from whom all this came, who handed this letter to whom, and that he was being forced to admit guilt to a crime he did not commit. In other words, these two cases — the one for which he was detained and the second one currently underway in the City Court — are connected with each other.

As for Bidzina Ivanishvili standing behind this, Irakli Garibashvili excludes this. He has not authorized me to make a statement regarding the person standing behind this case. However, he states that he will inform the investigation about this," the lawyer stated.