“As a result of investigative operations conducted by officers of the Anti-Corruption Agency of the State Security Service, Levan Akhobadze, former Deputy Head of the State Security Service, has been arrested on charges of accepting a bribe of an especially large sum,” announced at a briefing held at the State Security Service of Georgia (SSSG).

According to the SSSG statement, the investigation is being conducted under Article 338, Part 3, Subparagraph (e) of the Criminal Code, which carries a custodial sentence of between eleven and fifteen years.

“The investigation established that in April 2024, while serving as Deputy to the then Head of the State Security Service, Grigol Liluashvili, Akhobadze became aware that an undeclared sum of 40,000,000 Russian roubles (equivalent to 1,164,000 lari at the National Bank exchange rate) had been seized from a private entrepreneur at the Larsi customs checkpoint on the Georgian-Russian state border.

Under Georgian law, the transportation of cash exceeding 100,000 lari across the Georgian customs border by concealment or false declaration is subject either to a fine of ten per cent of the sum in question or to its outright confiscation. The entrepreneur in question approached the relevant bodies of the Revenue Service of the Ministry of Finance through the proper legal channels, with a view to paying the statutory fine and recovering the remainder of the seized funds; however, his application for the return of the money was refused.

Thereafter, Levan Akhobadze, former Deputy Head of the State Security Service, contacted the businessman in question through intermediaries and promised to assist in securing the return of the confiscated sum. Following negotiations, the entrepreneur recovered the seized funds at the Larsi checkpoint on April 30, 2024, upon payment of the statutory ten per cent fine. Akhobadze later re-established contact through intermediaries and demanded a bribe of 500,000 lari in exchange for his assistance. However, as emerges from one witness statement, the then Head of the SSSG, Grigol Liluashvili, intervened, and the sum demanded was halved; within a few days of the return of the confiscated funds, the entrepreneur handed 250,000 lari to an intermediary for onward transmission to Levan Akhobadze. It has also been confirmed that the bribe was delivered to the then Deputy Head of the State Security Service in his own office on the same day.

The investigation into these actions is being conducted under Article 338, Part 3, Subparagraph (e) of the Criminal Code of Georgia, which carries a custodial sentence of between eleven and fifteen years. The investigation is ongoing with a view to identifying other individuals involved in the offence, gathering the relevant evidence, and uncovering any further crimes of a similar nature,” the SSSG briefing stated.