Officials Reiterate No Foul Play Suspected in Zhvania’s Death

Georgian Interior Minister Vano Merabishvili and General Prosecutor Zurab Adeishvili denied some rumors involving conspiracy theories over the death of Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania and reiterated earlier official statements that the death of the Prime Minister was a tragic accident caused by carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning.

Both the Interior Minister and the General Prosecutor met with a group of Georgian reporters on February 3 and showed a short video tape depicting the apartment where the dead bodies of Prime Minister Zurab Zhvania and Raul Usupov, who according to the Georgian Interior Minister was Deputy Governor of Kvemo Kartli region, were found.

Footage was demonstrated only for journalists. Cameramen were denied attendance to this meeting. The footage, which runs approximately one minute, was recorded shortly after the dead bodies of the two men were found.

The footage shows Zurab Zhvania’s corpse lying on the floor on his back near the armchair. Officials explained that Zhvania’s dead body was removed from the armchair by his bodyguard, who was the first to find the corpses, in an attempt to provide artificial respiration.

Raul Usupov’s dead body was also lying on the floor near the door which divides the room where Zhvania’s body was lying from the kitchen.

There were couple of plates, food and an opened backgammon board on the table.

General Prosecutor Zurab Adeishvili said that a forensic examination of the food was also underway; however, he said that the experts are already almost sure that the deaths were a result of carbon monoxide (CO) poisoning caused by a faulty gas heater.

An Iranian-made heating device was installed in the apartment, which Raul Usupov was renting in the Saburtalo district of capital Tbilisi, just two days before the accident.