Blog
Money Laundering Explained
On October 18, the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) reported detaining employees of Cartu Bank, who were carrying a large amount of cash (according to the reports, EUR 1 million and USD 2 million were seized) and were suspected of engaging in grand money laundering.
Obscure Lease of Mushtaidi Park
Georgian media reported in June that the Tbilisi Mayor’s Office had handed over the Mushtaidi Park to a private company with a long-term lease. A representative of the Property Management Agency of the Mayor’s Office (which was cited as the source of the information) stated that the Geo Gold company had acquired the park’s management rights for the next 49 years and would invest GEL 1 million in the park over the next five years. The same official said that the Mayor’s Office was planning to employ this kind of management model for the city’s other parks.
New approach to Charity in Adjara
By the decision of Adjara’s authorities numerous homeless people, including the elderly, single mothers, and ill people were forced to leave the only charity house in the region.The Batumi Charity House had been managed by the charitable fund of St. Francesca and St. Nino since 1995, when it was granted to the fund by a decree of the ruler of Adjara at the time. In 2006 the new government of Adjara refused to recognize the validity of the 1995 decree and forced its residents to leave, after which the new owners (whose identity is unknown) demolished the building.
Coerced into cheering Nicolas Sarkozy
What would you do if you wanted to see or cheer for a prominent political leader, like Nicolas Sarkozy, the French president? If that leader is giving a public speech, you would simply go there, right? But what if you were ordered by your superior to attend that event? Despite your interest in seeing the speech, you might refuse to go there or if you did go, you might have lost your original enthusiasm.
Six Questions: Georgia shouldn’t rest on its laurels
A recent report from the Centre for Law and Democracy and other international organizations called “Ask Your Government! The 6 Question Campaign” ranks Georgia second in the world for support of the right to information in practice. In fact, despite Georgia’s high rank, there is substantial room for improvement in the government’s responses to Freedom of Information (FOI) requests. Because researchers from TI Georgia contributed to the report, we want to provide some context for the information it contains, and some clarification regarding the reporting of the research results in the Georgian media.
