Ex-PM Merabishvili on scandalous video

Merabishvili said two Russian advisers had been involved in Mukhrovani case; Photo by RFE/RL

Agenda.ge, 30 Jan 2014 - 16:33, Tbilisi,Georgia

Georgia’s ex-Prime Minister Vano Merabishvili says people have misinterpreted his words "I need two dead bodies” in the video that leaked on the internet yesterday.

Merabishvili, who currently is in detention for unrelated charges, explained the video before his trial started at Kutaisi Court today.

He said he never gave an order to murder anyone.

"There were two Russian advisers, GRU [Russia's largest foreign intelligence agency] members, involved in the Mukhrovani mutiny. We had information that they had been eliminated by mutiny participants in order to hide [Russia’s involvement],” the ex-PM said.

"In the recording, it is shown that I am giving an order to find [the dead bodies of] these two men. [This was needed] to prove the links between the mutiny and Russia,” Merabishvili said.

To prove he did not want to kill anyone, he said that later on riot police detained a group of [Georgian] rangers but no firearms were used against them.

Merabishvili claimed there was no connection between the special operation held at Mukhrovani and the operation held on the Tianeti highway three weeks later, where one military high official was killed and two others were wounded.

Today, the highway attack survivors said Merabishvili was lying when he talked about the Russian advisers’ involvement in the coup. They considered themselves to be the "two dead bodies” Merabishvili orderd his army to get.