Abkhazian militia denies involvement of Georgia's MIA in Monk Iona's liberation

The information that the monk Father Iona, the Georgian priest of the temple Sameba (Holy Trinity), was released as a result of activities of the Georgian Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) in Abkhazia does not correspond to reality. This was stated by Laurens Kogoniya, the head of the Interior Division of the Gali District of Abkhazia, located near the border with Georgia.

Let us remind you that the disappearance of the monk was announced on January 28 by Archbishop Seraphim, Metropolitan of Borjomi and Bakuriani. He said that the monk entered the territory of Abkhazia on January 24 and disappeared. According to a relative of the missing person, he was contacted by unidentified persons from Abkhazia, who demanded a ransom for Iona, amounting to 100,000 US dollars. On February 11, Shota Utiashvili, Chief of the Analytical Department of the Georgian MIA, reported that the monk was released as a result of activities of the Georgian MIA in Abkhazia.

"The Republic's law enforcement bodies had no information about presence of the priest in the territory of Abkhazia," Laurens Kogoniya said in his interview to the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

He believes that the monk was forcibly kept in Georgia; however, the Georgian side purposefully stated that he was forcibly kept in Abkhazia.

"The Georgian MIA may not conduct special operations in the territory of Abkhazia. And if they were able to carry out measures in their territory and managed to release the priest, that is their right," Laurens Kogoniya has emphasized.

According to Temur Shergeliya, Chief of the Gali Branch of the State Security Service of Abkhazia, the lists of citizens, who had legally crossed the Georgian-Abkhazian border checkpoint "Ingur", contained no name of the citizen Mamuka Maisuradze (Priest Iona). "There was no a person with that surname among the detained and released illegal aliens," Temur Shergeliya stated earlier.