Parliament Speaker claims “disinformation campaign” aimed at unrest following “inauthentic” recording of Russian businessman, former Georgian PM

Shalva Papuashvili, the Speaker of the Parliament of Georgia, on Tuesday claimed the existence of a “disinformation campaign” being carried out “against Georgia” with the aim of “causing unrest and involving the country in a war” following a release of an unconfirmed audio recording of an alleged call between Russian businessman Vladimer Evtushenkov and former Georgian Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili.

Papuashvili was responding to the recording that was posted on Monday on the YouTube platform, with the authenticity of the file not confirmed, and called the release an example of a “fabrication”.

From what we saw yesterday, this is an example of how fabrication happens, [and] then the topic is raised and presented as if we are dealing with some sort of scandal. Overall, the goal of this is [to cause] unrest in the country - there is a stated goal to change the Government in an undemocratic way and then involve the country in a war,” Papuashvili said.

The Parliament Speaker said “everything indicates” the released recording “is not authentic”, and challenged the source of the release to prove otherwise. In his comments, Papuashvili called the release a result of a “conveyor of a disinformation campaign” against the state and its citizens.