The presumption that the article “Coronavirus: How ‘three musketeers’ helped Georgia fight virus” is commissioned is not true – Press Service of BBC said.

On July 7, Zurab Japaridze, Leader of Girchi Party said that the Georgian government was ordering foreign media to write articles about success of Georgia in struggle against COVID-19 pandemic.

Georgian Public Broadcaster asked BBC to answer the allegation and received the following answer:

“It is not true that this article was commissioned. It is true that an advertisement is published on BBC.COM, but BBC News and current news cannot be sponsored. We do not accept political advertising. Like the rest of the BBC News, this article is an independent and impartial piece of journalism that complies with our editorial rules,” the BBC’s press service said.

On July 6, BBC published an article “Coronavirus: How ‘three musketeers’ helped Georgia fight virus” by Rayhan Demytrie.

According to the article, Georgia was included in a list of 15 non-EU states the European Union considers safe enough to open its borders to.

Three musketeers are Head of the NCDC, Amiran Gamkrelidze, the man in charge of the Lugar lab, Paata Imnadze, Deputy Head of NCDC and the main virologist, Tengiz Tsertsvadze, who is head of Tbilisi’s infectious diseases, Aids and immunology research centre.