Georgia again postpones destruction of MIA's archive with citizens' privacy records

The destruction of a part of the archive of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (MIA) of Georgia, containing video and audio records accumulated as a result of illegal secret surveillance and tapping of citizens' private life has been delayed again but will happen soon. This was announced today by the Minister of Internal Affairs Irakli Garibashvili.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that the above archive was found at the MIA in October 2012, after the coalition "Georgian Dream" came to power. In late May 2013, the MIA declared its intention to destroy the records within a week; then the deadline was moved to June 23; and still later, the MIA officials promised to destroy the files by August 15.

According to Garibashvili, the reason of the new delay is in the fact that some of the members of the special commission set up for the destruction are away from Georgia.

Up to 100 files with records of intimate nature are subject to destruction. However, the MIA will keep records of political trials for further study. In total, the archive has 24,000 files with materials about the personal life of politicians, diplomats, journalists, clergy and public leaders.

It is expected that the above commission will monitor the destruction process; however, the presence of journalists has not been decided yet.