The Georgian Dream press office issued a statement in response to the recent information disseminated by the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) regarding Bidzina Ivanishvili, the honorary chairman of the Georgian Dream(GD) party.

“We want to address the recent information released by the OCCRP about Bidzina Ivanishvili, the honorary chairman of Georgian Dream.

Just a few days ago, this organization falsely claimed that the Ivanishvili family had bought property in Moscow. However, neither Bidzina Ivanishvili nor his family members have acquired any property in Russia since 1998, and they have not even travelled to the country. We were able to disprove this misinformation with clear and undeniable facts. It seems that in response to being caught in a lie, the media outlet has now issued another baseless statement to defend itself.

The OCCRP now claims that their report was not about Bidzina Ivanishvili but focused on his wife, Ekaterine Khvedelidze. However, the property in Russia that the organization presented as a ‘newly discovered scandal’ was actually disclosed by Bidzina Ivanishvili himself in his 2013 property declaration, where he listed the assets held by his family members, including his wife. Furthermore, a section for family members’ assets in the declaration form demonstrates that this is considered common property. Thus, the OCCRP’s claim that their report was solely about Ekaterine Khvedelidze and not Bidzina Ivanishvili is a weak attempt to evade the truth.

Additionally, the OCCRP attempted to bring the topic of Georgia’s offshore law into the discussion, but we see no reason to engage with this issue here. The fact that the law is sound, legally robust, and beneficial to Georgia is already known to the public. Discussing complex offshore matters with media outlets that fail to understand even basic declaration rules is pointless.

This experience reinforces our decision to refrain from cooperating with this organization. We hope that in the future, articles of this nature will at least meet basic standards of integrity and competence.,” the GD stated.