The Georgian authorities have agreed to extradite Badri Patarkatsishvili, a media and financial tycoon, to Russia, the Civil Georgia web-site reported on Wednesday quoting a report by the Imedi Television, co-owned by Patarkatsishvili.

Patarkatsishvili has been closely associated with exiled russian billionaire Boris Berezovsky since the very beginning of the 1990s.

In June 2001, the Russian Prosecutor General’s Office charged him with organizing an attempted escape from prison of Nikolay Glushkov (former Deputy Director-General of Russia’s top carrier Aeroflot, arrested on fraud charges), and in October 2002 – by default with an alleged grand fraud related to the AvtoVAZ case.

In August 2006, Patarkatsishvili sold his 100% share of the Russian Kommersant editorial house to Alisher Usmanov.

The Imedi Television cited unnamed “source” and said that the information is “unofficial.” It also said that Patarkatsishvili is “now wanted by the Georgian law enforcers.”

The Georgian governmental officials declined to confirm the report.

“I have no information about it,” Eka Zguladze, Deputy Interior Minster, told reporters after the government session.

“I have no information; I can not comment on this,” Gia Kavtaradze, the Justice Minister, said.

“Who is the source of this information? Extradition of Patarkatsishvili to Russia by the Georgian authorities is ruled out,” Kakha Lomaia, the Education Minister, said.
Patarkatsishvili, who is currently based in London, said in an interview with the Imedi TV on March 5 that he has left Georgia and transferred his “businesses into the West” to avoid becoming engaged in the country’s internal political standoff between the authorities and opposition.

Patarkatsishvili, who has been at odds with the Georgian authorities recently, also said that he is not afraid of being extradited to Russia because he holds the Georgian citizenship “and it is hardly imaginable that I will face a threat in this regard.”

In recent days Imedi TV, which is co-owned by Patarkatsishvili and News Corporation, spend large portion of its political programs’ air time on covering issues relating with the authorities stance towards Patarkatsishvili.

A formal reason for this extensive coverage became a taped phone conversation between prison inmate Paata Mamardashvili, described as criminal boss and Gia Dgebuadze, who the Imedi TV says is an official from the Interior Ministry’s Department for Constitutional Security (DCS).

In the taped conversation, which was aired by the Imedi TV, the Interior Ministry official tells the criminal boss to try to get “compromising materials” against Patarkatsishvili.

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