The Prosecutor General’s Office of Georgia has charged former Defense Minister Juansher Burchuladze with abuse of official powers and money laundering committed by a person holding a state-political position. This is stated in a press release issued by the agency.

“As a result of an investigation conducted by the Anti-Corruption Agency of the State Security Service, it was established that in 2023 the then–Minister of Defense of Georgia abused his official powers to obtain benefits for himself and his relative. Specifically, at his instruction, the Deputy Defense Minister at the time and the former head of the Procurement Department of the Ministry of Defense, with the assistance of the ex-minister’s relative, created a non-competitive environment in the procurement process of medical equipment for a military hospital. As a result, through fictitious transactions, the price of the equipment was inflated: a medical device worth 2,606,272 GEL was supplied to the Ministry of Defense for 3,940,000 GEL. Consequently, the Ministry of Defense of Georgia suffered property damage amounting to 1,333,728 GEL.

The former Defense Minister, in order to conceal the origin of illegal and unjustified assets in a particularly large amount and to give them a lawful appearance, carried out the following actions:

In January 2025, he and his wife purchased a land plot with a house in Spain for 544,000 euros. Since they had no documented legal source of these funds, in 2024 a fictitious real estate sales contract was drawn up in Tskneti between the ex-minister’s wife and a third party. In reality, the family of the former minister did not sell the property; the purpose of the contract was solely to disguise the origin of the money intended to be transferred to Spain.

Furthermore, in March 2025, in order to conceal the illegal origin of the aforementioned 544,000 euros, the former minister failed to declare the purchased property in Spain in his asset declaration as a public official. By doing so, he laundered illegal and unjustified income in a particularly large amount totaling 1,593,212 GEL.

The detainee has been charged under subparagraph “g” of part 3 of article 194 and part 2 of article 332 of the Criminal Code of Georgia (abuse of official powers by a person holding a state-political position and money laundering). These provisions provide for a penalty of up to 12 years of imprisonment.

The Prosecutor’s Office will, within the timeframe established by law, petition the court to impose pretrial detention as a preventive measure for the accused.