TBILISI. Feb 7 (Interfax-AVN) - Three officers who had bought in Ukraine several armored vehicles that broke shortly after commissioning have been brought to trial, an Interfax-Military News Agency correspondent reports.
Monday saw the preliminary hearing of the materials of the case of Mamuka Lomsadze, David Natroshvili and Bessarion Bukvaidze, arrested last year after 38 of the 40 BMP-2 vehicles which they bought from Ukraine for service with the Georgian armed forces failed to operate during the first time they were employed in maneuvers.
Lawyers of the accused told reporters that they would demand that ex-defense minister Giorgi Baramidze and Armed Forces Chief of Staff Colonel Levan Nikoleishvili be interrogated, as well as that an additional investigation be conducted in Ukraine.
The accused plead not guilty.
The damage inflicted on the state amounts to $330,500.
On September 30, 2004, a contract on supplies of weapons and equipment was signed between the Georgian Defense Ministry and Ukraine's Ukrspetsexport company, which envisaged the delivery of 40 BMP-2 vehicles worth $6.8 million will to Georgia.
The Tbilisi district court ruled on October 5 to leave in force the Tbilisi municipal court's sentence that provides for a three-month preliminary imprisonment for the three accused officers.
During the session on September 23, 2005, the Tbilisi municipal court adopted a decision to keep the accused in custody for three months during which the investigation was to be held.
The men accused say that the vehicles were in proper order and broke because they were misused and wrongly maintained in Georgia.