Leakage of priests' shadowing records sparks scandal in Georgia

Record of shadowing priests of the Georgian Patriarchate were posted on the Internet and made public in the media. In the opinion of the opposition, the leakage of the records has to do with the "Georgian Dream" Party. In its turn, the ruling party has claimed another attack on the authorities and the clergy.

On September 13, files appeared on the Internet, allegedly obtained as a result of the leak of materials from the Georgian State Security Service (SSS), under the general title "SSS' compromising materials directed against the Patriarchy." They were posted by the user under nicknamed "Khakim Pasha", belonging, presumably, to a former special agent, the "Georgia-Online" reports.

The posted files are accompanied with a comment that the SSS "is the greatest danger for Georgia."

According to Zurab Djaparidze, the leader of the "Girchi-More Freedom" Party, there is nothing new in the fact that special services collect information about citizens. In his opinion, the distribution of the records has the aim to blackmail the clergy in order to force parishioners to vote for the "Georgian Dream" Party at the local elections to be held on October 2.

The "United National Movement" (UNM) is sure that the shadowing of the clergy was organized by the current authorities. Nika Meliya, the UNM chairman, has stated that in Georgia, special services are shadowing everyone in general.

Members of the "Georgian Dream" Party have also reacted to the publication of the records. "We have witnessed another attack on the state and the church by the UNM and its own TV channels," Mamuka Mdinaradze, the executive secretary of the "Georgian Dream" Party, has stated.

This article was originally published on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’ on September 14, 2021 at 02:35 am MSK. To access the full text of the article, click here.